Questions
by Mic RiddyBanon
Summary: Episode tag to 1x16 Dead to Rights. My take on the missing scenes after Oliver reveals his identity to Tommy. Then follows on to different POVs on the reveal & Tommy's new role within the Team once he knows. I'm taking this all the way through to the Undertaking & afterwards so stick with me & I hope you enjoy! The Undertaking has now been uploaded, enjoy! Now complete :D
1. Chapter 1

**This is my first ever fanfic/fic of any kind so please go easy on me. I have written this at the bequest (and challenge) of my good friend, beta, and fellow writer Rennie75. All mistakes are mine.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Arrow or any of the characters - CW does, I'm only playing with them.**

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><p>When Oliver made the decision to take off his hood and reveal himself to Tommy he knew there were going to be questions. He knew he wouldn't be able to get away with just saying "a lot" when Tommy asked him what happened on the Island this time. Just as he'd known there would be questions when he revealed himself to Diggle, and later on to Felicity. The difference was this time it was his best friend, a man who'd known him before the Island, before the scars - and this time he didn't know what he was going to say, how he was going to answer those ...<p>

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"So, you finally going to give me a straight answer about what happened to you on that Island?" Tommy asked when they were back at Verdant. Tommy had wanted to talk at the Mansion but Oliver had insisted on bringing them here, to the club. He wasn't quite sure why but, as long as Oliver was finally going to talk, he didn't really care where they were.

"Yes, but first I need you to come with me, I need to show you something." Oliver led Tommy to the back of the club, to the secret entrance to the lair. Earlier he'd sent a message to both Diggle and Felicity so he knew that no-one else would interrupt them or be there in the way. He wanted to be certain of how Tommy was going to deal with the knowledge that he was the Vigilante before he would risk revealing their involvement. Oliver also figured there was enough stuff Tommy would want to talk about without making it more involved.

He'd brought Tommy to his lair, his 'Arrowcave' as Diggle and Felicity had named it, as this was the one place he felt safe, where he could truly be himself. This was going to take a lot out of him and doing at the Mansion where everything was a mask just wasn't going to work.

Oliver led Tommy through and down into the lair, observing Tommy's reactions as they went. He heard the way Tommy's breath hitched and then paused as Tommy realised where they were, what he was being shown. Saw the look in Tommy's eyes of amazement with a hint of concern and a bit of anger in his eyes as he saw the weapons. Noticed the way Tommy paused on the stairs hesitating as they came into view. Registered the quizzical look Tommy flashed Oliver as he saw the salmon ladder. Oliver wasn't sure if he'd seen one before, maybe in those kung-fu videos they'd watched as kids, but couldn't really remember.

"So, I know you have questions …" Oliver hesitated. He had no idea what else to say, how to continue, so he just left the sentence hanging hoping Tommy would pick it up from there.

"Yeah, like what happened to you, why weren't you going to tell me, how can you just kill like that? Where did you learn to shoot, to fight - you said you were alone on the Island?!" Tommy said accusingly.

"I wasn't alone, the Island had other people on it, some very dangerous people."

"So why did you say you were alone? Why did you lie to your family, to Laurel, to me?!"

"Because I knew if people knew they'd have a lot of questions, they'd want to know what happened to me, and I wasn't ready to talk. I knew the way they'd look at me if they found out and I didn't want that." Oliver couldn't help but think back to the polygraph, to Lance's questions and Laurel's response to finding out about his scars, the torture. "I have scars Tommy, a lot of them."

"Scars?"

Oliver didn't know how to go on so he decided it would probably be easiest to just show him, but knew he had to warn Tommy a bit more first so took a deep breath.

"The doctor, when I first got back, he examined me." Another deep breath in, letting it out slowly to control his heart rate. He schooled his features to neutrality, prepared for the look of disgust that was bound to follow once Tommy saw them." He said that about 20% of my body is covered in scar tissue, I have second degree burns on my back and arms, and at least 12 fractures that never healed properly."

"What?!" Tommy was shaken and scared by that. Just what had his friend been through to cause what he was describing; and why had he never spoken to him about this? "Oliver will you please just tell me what the hell happened to you on that island?!"

"I was tortured Tommy." Again Oliver hesitated not knowing how to go on.

Tommy was completely shocked by that revelation. He didn't know what it was he'd expected Oliver to say, but torture?! He sighed, recognising that Oliver was at least trying to be honest this time even if it wasn't easy going. Although Oliver's face was blank it wasn't hard to see the pain in his eyes or the tension rolling off his friend. "Show me."

Oliver nodded, he'd known it would come to this, known that when he'd made the decision to reveal himself. But that knowledge didn't make it any easier. At least this time it had been his choice, not like when Speedy had walked in on him; or when Lance had forced him to reveal it to him and at the same time Laurel. Laurel, she'd looked at him differently since then and now Tommy would too. All of this flashed through his mind in the few seconds it took him to take his jumper off.

Oliver just stood there, not meeting Tommy's eyes, not saying a word, just standing completely still like a statue. Tommy gave a long low whistle as he realised just how bad the scars were. So many injuries, what had they done to his friend to cause them? He had more questions now than even, but he just wasn't sure he wanted to know the answers anymore.

Oliver turned around slowly so that Tommy could see his back too. He was keeping a tight reign on his breathing and reactions, still being careful not to meet Tommy's eyes. He didn't want to see the look that he knew would be there, to know that his friendship with Tommy was over, after all how could he still want to be his friend now that he knew how damaged he was.

Tommy honestly didn't know what he was supposed to say or do now. Even with the warning about the doctor's comments he hadn't expected this, this tale of horror and pain written on his friend's body. He knew that Oliver was struggling, but wasn't sure how to help. "You don't have to tell me about all of them, but maybe talking would help. Tell me what happened when you first got to the island. What was it called?"

"The Island is called Lian Yu, it means 'purgatory' but it was hell for me. I had barely made it to the Island a day when I got shot with an arrow, here." Oliver pointed to the scar by his right shoulder. "The man who shot me thought I was one of the soldiers, but when he realised I wasn't he looked after me, kept me alive, taught me about finding food. He taught me that I had to be willing to kill the animals if I wanted to survive. He was the first one to tell me how to shoot an arrow. The soldiers caught up to us then, they caught me and put me in a hole in the ground to start with. They took me to a man called Fyres and he questioned me. He showed me a photo of a man, said the man's name was Yao Fei and asked if I knew him."

Oliver took a small breath before continuing, noting that Tommy seemed to be willing to listen. He wasn't sure why but there was no look of disgust in Tommy's eyes, yet anyway.

"And did you?" Tommy asked.

"Yes, he was the man who'd looked after me." Oliver continued. "I told Fyres I didn't know him but he didn't believe me. When I refused to give him up Fyres called in one of his men and said that if I wasn't willing to talk then his man would get it out of me. The man had a sword with him and he used it on me." Oliver pointed to those scars as he was talking. "I thought when I was shot with that arrow that that was the worst pain imaginable. Then when they tortured me I realised I was wrong and knew that this must be it. I was still wrong though."

Oliver stopped then so after a few minutes of silence Tommy prompted him. "What happened then?"

"Fyres realised I wasn't going to betray Yao Fei and so told his man to kill me. Just then Yao Fei arrived, he stopped them and rescued me. He saved my life, again." Oliver gave a small sigh. "Later on I met other people, a few friends, most enemies. Slade Wilson taught me to fight. Man, I remember how weak and useless he thought I was to start with, I could barely even do a few push ups!" Oliver said with a small attempt at a laugh.

Tommy realised that this was getting too much for Oliver and he really needed a distraction. "So how many can you do now then?" He asked in an effort to ease things and change the direction of the conversation.

"Nah man, push ups are too easy for him now, so he uses the salmon ladder to show off now instead!" Diggle answered for Oliver.

Oliver had known that Diggle was there, just as he knew Felicity was too – he could smell the vanilla scent of the shampoo she used. But they had stayed in the background out of sight until he - or apparently Diggle - had decided it was safe for them to reveal themselves. As much as he was annoyed that Diggle had made the decision instead of waiting for him, he really needed to work off some of the pent up emotion that telling Tommy had caused so he went over to the salmon ladder.

"Err are you sure that's safe, should you be doing that?" Tommy asked cautiously, he couldn't help being curious at the same time though. He had seen one of those things in an action film years ago but had never actually seen it _really_ being done.

Diggle just laughed as Oliver grabbed the steel bar and started 'showing off' as Diggle had put it. He went up there in record time much to Tommy's amazement, before just dropping straight down from the top and landing completely silently like it was nothing at all!

"That's nothing, wait until you see him fight!" It was Felicity who spoke this time.

She must have judged it safe as Oliver had yet to ball out Diggle for coming out of the shadows. Oliver had no intention of letting Digg off that easy though! He picked up the steel batons they used to spar with and threw two of them to Diggle. After all, he might as well work off some more of that frustration at the same time as letting Digg know of his annoyance for not waiting for him to say it was clear _before_ he and Felicity had revealed themselves.

"Tommy, you've already met Diggle my 'bodyguard', he's Special Forces out of Khandahar; and this is Felicity, my IT 'Girl Friday'."

"Ermm, Oliver ..." Tommy said anxiously. Despite just having seen Oliver do that salmon ladder, and having heard the reports of what the Vigilant could do, that was very different to seeing Oliver fight this big 'special forces' man and he was nervous of what might happen.

"It's okay, Digg might have arms the size of bricks but Oliver's the better fighter." Felicity tried to reassure Tommy. It didn't work.

"Hey!" Diggle said, trying to sound insulted and failing miserably.

"Oh come on Digg you know that Oliver's better at it than you I don't mean at 'it' I just mean at fighting that's not to say I don't think you are a good fighter too I do think that you're a good fighter it's just that Oliver's better and well"

"Felicity!" Oliver said, effectively stopping her mid-babble.

"I'm doing it again aren't I, sigh!"

"Yep." Oliver ended any further conversation then by aiming a blow at Diggle and nearly catching him out. As he aimed the baton at Diggle he was looking at Tommy, at his eyes. Much to Oliver's surprise there was still no look of disgust, just concern - presumably at the fact that he was going to fight Diggle. He didn't understand this, but was going to enjoy still having his best friend whilst he could.

It was all Tommy could do to keep up with watching the speed of the fight going on in front of him. He'd never seen anything like it! Felicity was right, Diggle might have 'arms the size of bricks' but Oliver _was_ the better fighter. How he was better than this special forces guy Tommy still didn't know. But he knew a lot more than he had done just a few hours ago. There might still be a long way to go, but it was enough for now, he decided. He might not understand why Oliver killed or even why he had become this Vigilante, but if these two people could be here so clearly supporting him, then there must be more to it.

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Later on Tommy thought back to all he'd learnt that long day. He thought about Oliver, Diggle, and Felicity. They made up an odd grouping these three, the rich playboy, the special forces man, and an IT girl?! But Tommy could see that it clearly worked. They were so clearly at home around each other and in this place. The way that neither man had taken offense by Felicity's babble – or had even seemed surprised by it for that matter – clearly showed how used to it they were. He couldn't help but wonder what else she had come out with for them to be this used to it?

It was strange how Oliver hadn't been surprised when they came out of – where _had_ they come out of anyway? This place must be bigger than he had realised. It was clear now that you couldn't sneak up on Oliver, but still, Tommy hadn't seen or heard any sign that they were there. Oliver's senses really must be like a ninja's!

Also, neither Diggle nor Felicity had seemed to be surprised by Oliver's scars or the fact that he didn't have a shirt on. Did he always train like that then, without a shirt on? You could hardly miss those horrendous scars, yet neither had even reacted to them. Tommy wondered just how much Oliver had told _them_ about the island. It was clear that Oliver and Diggle were used to sparring together. Just how long had they known Oliver's secret, and why had Oliver told them but not him?

He couldn't help but feel a bit jealous, and also unsure of himself and his place in Oliver's life. For it was now clear that _this_ was Oliver's real life – not the playboy he was still pretending to be to the rest of the world. Oliver seemed at home here in a way he had yet to be at the Mansion or anywhere else that Tommy had seen him.

Tommy still had questions, many of them. But for now he had his best friend back, far more than he had before, even if he hadn't realised it at the time. Also, Oliver had just saved his father's life, he figured he owed him for that. His friend needed his support. The rest of it, the questions, well they would just have to wait.


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Wow, so happy with the responses I've received for this already, you guys certainly do know how to make a new writer feel welcome! Thank you all so very much! Thank you also to TheOddManOut for being my beta for this chapter so that I can surprise my normal beta Rennie75 with this update - hope you like it Rennie75! As requested I am now continuing with this story (muse willing). Tommy's memories of his conversation with Felicity are in italics. Please do continue to follow, fav, and review! Thank you! Enjoy ...**

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><p><em>Tommy still had questions, many of them. But for now he had his best friend back, far more than he had before, even if he hadn't realised it at the time. Also, Oliver had just saved his father's life, he figured he owed him for that. His friend needed his support. The rest of it, the questions, well they would just have to wait.<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

It had now been just over a week since Tommy had found who Oliver really was and in that time he'd had to do a lot of thinking and had taken a new look at his view of the world around him. He'd spent time at the 'Arrowcave' as Felicity had informed him Oliver's base was now called and had spent a fair bit of that talking with both Diggle and Felicity. He needed to know more about this side, this person, Oliver clearly was with them and to do that he had decided the best to do was to talk to them.

The main thing he wanted to know of course was how they could support Oliver killing people. Felicity's response to that had probably surprised him the most as she seemed the more gentle person. He had thought that she would be the quiet one, the easier one to talk to. But Tommy had soon discovered how wrong that assumption was – and just how scary Felicity could be when someone did or said something that she took as an attack on Oliver! Something he was keen to avoid doing again!

Felicity had not taken his questions about Oliver being a killer well at all he remembered …

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_"So how do you deal with all of this, with Oliver killing people?!" Tommy had asked Felicity._

_"Killing people?! Is that all you can see?! How about all the lives he _saves_ I mean do you even have any idea what he has done to help the people in this city with no regard at all for his own safety or what could happen to him all he sees is the people who are failing the city and that they need to be stopped and he doesn't ever stop to think of the risks he takes himself the danger he puts himself in! Oliver knows how many people are being hurt and how many lives are being ruined by the people on The List and if he gets hurt in the process then he just deals with that and keeps on going. Did you know he doesn't even use anesthetic because it would slow him down and dull his responses if he needed to deal with anything before it wore off?! Did you even stop to _notice_ how many of those scars are recent and _not_ from the Island?!_

_Tommy had backed away hands up slightly trying to pacify her, but that had been just as successful as her previous attempts at reassuring him when Oliver had been about to spar with Diggle in front of him for the first time. In other words it hadn't worked at all! It was amazing how intimidating and scary this small woman could be even though he was taller than her._

_She hadn't let him get away so easily though and had backed him right up until he was backed against Oliver's work desk with all the arrows on it, all the time pointing her finger at him and poking him to accentuate her words. Still, he'd had to admit she had a point, Oliver _did_ have new scars and he hadn't thought to ask where they had come from._

_"So tell me?" Tommy had asked Felicity. But he'd been a bit thrown by her response._

_"Has he told you how I got involved in all this, how I became a part of the Team?"_

_"Err no, he hasn't told me very much to be honest, just a bit about the island and how he got the early scars." Tommy replied._

_"I saved his life" Felicity stated simply._

_Now Tommy really was thrown. He'd been prepared for Oliver saving her maybe or something like that, but this little woman saving him? That was one of the last things he'd expected her to say!_

_"I found him bleeding out in the back seat of my car in the parking garage at QC after his mother shot him."_

_Moira shot Oliver?_

_"Huh, when did that happen?" Tommy replied. He didn't remember Oliver being hurt or in the hospital except that time after Christmas when he'd been hit by that semi … or at least Diggle had told everyone Oliver had been hit by a semi. Now he couldn't help wondering if that had been true either. "Was this at Christmas, after the Queen's party when Diggle told us Oliver was hit by a semi?"_

_"See that's exactly my point! No it wasn't that was another time but this is exactly what I mean Oliver was shot and injured so badly he died on us and we had to restart his heart yet you his best friend didn't even know he had been hurt!"_

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That had really hit home hard to him Tommy remembered, especially as he couldn't dispute it and he knew that she was right. How could he not have known that Oliver had been shot – had nearly died? He hadn't even known he was hurt. He still felt really guilty about that now. It was also true that he hadn't stopped to consider all the lives Oliver was saving, just the ones he was taking. Yet even the news had picked up on the drop in crime since the Vigilante had been around. Maybe he had been too hard on Oliver, too quick to judge without finding out more. That was why he'd decided he needed to talk to Diggle. Maybe if he could find out more about this 'List' that Felicity had mentioned he would be able to understand.

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><p><strong>AN2: Okay, yes it is a shorter chapter this time, but I'm going to pick up on the conversation with Diggle in the next chapter. Hope you all like it, please do let me know what you think. Story suggestions are very welcome, thank you!<strong>


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: Thank you so much for all your continued support, it means so much to me and I can't believe how many have followed/faved/reviewed this fic! Thank you! There is going to be at least one more chapter to this story after this one.**

**Disclaimer: I still own nothing, everything belongs to CW!**

_That had really hit home hard to him Tommy remembered, especially as he couldn't dispute it and he knew that she was right. How could he not have known that Oliver had been shot - had nearly died? He hadn't even known that he was hurt. He still felt really guilty about that now. It was also true that he hadn't stopped to consider all the lives that Oliver was saving, just the ones that he was taking. Yet even the news had picked up on the drop in crime since the Vigilante had been around. Maybe he had been too hard on Oliver, too quick to judge without finding out more. That's why he'd decided he needed to talk to Diggle. Maybe if he could find out more about this 'List' that Felicity had mentioned he would be able to understand._

**_Tommy's POV_**

Now Tommy knew that he needed to speak to Diggle he just had to find a time to do it without Oliver around – apparently that was harder than he'd thought it would be though! Talking to Felicity alone had been easy, she was at the Arrowcave whilst Oliver and Diggle were out on patrol. But Diggle didn't seem to leave Oliver alone all that much, even though it was now abundantly clear that Oliver was the very _last_ person to need a bodyguard!

Still, after a few days of trying, Tommy had managed to have a couple of words in private with Diggle to say that he needed to talk to him properly. They had agreed to meet at the Arrowcave later that evening whilst Oliver was having a meal with his family. The only problem was that now he finally had Diggle alone, he had no idea of how or where to start ...

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After waiting for Tommy to say something beyond "Hi" for a good few minutes Diggle finally took pity on him and decided to give the boy a break by starting the conversation for him. After all, Tommy _had_ had a _lot_ of news to take in and adjust to in a fairly short period of time - and unlike Felicity and himself Tommy had known pre-island Oliver, known him so well they were like brothers, a relationship Diggle understood all too well.

"So, I hear you had a bit of a chat with Felicity – how'd that go?" Diggle started by asking.

"Not as well as I'd have liked. I had _no_ idea she could be so scary!"

Diggle just chuckled before answering. "Yeah, man that girl can be one scary woman when she chooses. Have you figured out the most important rules around here? First, never touch Felicity's computers without her express permission – and even then it can be risky; and second, never ever come between her and Oliver or say anything to disparage him around her!"

"Yeah, think I've figured that out – could have used that warning beforehand though." Tommy said with a rueful smile.

"So which one did you break?" Diggle asked.

"Saying stuff about Oliver."

"And you're still here to tell the tale? She _must_ have gone easy on you!" Diggle said with surprise. "What did you say?"

"I asked her how she dealt with all of this, with Oliver killing people."

"Ah! So what did she say" Diggle responded curiously.

"She didn't actually give me a straight answer, but managed to make me feel pretty guilty. I never stopped to wonder about his more recent injuries and scars, or thought about the dangers he puts himself in. Felicity told me about Moira shooting Oliver, she said he died and you had to restart his heart?" Tommy queried wanting verification of whether it had really come that close.

"Yeah, we did." Diggle confirmed. "If Felicity hadn't been there Oliver would have died. I have basic medical training from the army and can handle most injuries now. But the wires had come loose in the defibrillator and I wouldn't even have thought to check that, let alone known how to fix it. Felicity saved Oliver's life twice that day."

Tommy just thought about that for a minute. He had spent five years thinking his best friend was dead and then had been lucky enough to get him back – and now he'd found out just how close he'd come to losing Oliver again without even knowing. He couldn't help but wonder just how many other close calls Oliver had had, and wasn't sure he wanted the answer to that question.

"So, I'm guessing you still want to know how we do it, why we do it." Diggle said matter of factly after Tommy had been silent again for a few minutes. "Felicity asked me the same question the day she found out. She wanted to know how it was that I wasn't bothered by the killing, even if I hadn't dropped any bodies myself. I'll give you the same answer I gave her. When I was in Afghanistan my unit was tasked with protecting a local warlord. He was a real piece of scum, even sold kids. We came under attack and when it was over I knew which one I'd killed. Man he was just a kid, barely 18, and I asked myself am I still a good man? Doing this with Oliver, protecting the city and taking down bad guys, makes me feel good again. We're doing something to help, to make a difference to the city and those in it who can't defend themselves."

"So where do you get the names from? Felicity mentioned a list?" Tommy asked.

"Oliver got the List from his father, but that's something you're going to have to ask Oliver about yourself." Diggle answered.

Oliver came into the Arrowcave then, effectively putting an end to that conversation.

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Tommy had understood that Diggle wasn't trying to avoid the question, but was simply being loyal to Oliver. It was abundantly clear just how loyal both Diggle and Felicity were to him and Tommy was grateful that Oliver had found such supportive friends. Despite that however, he was still struggling with why Oliver had trusted them with his identity and yet not him - his oldest friend! They had always been like brothers, yet Oliver had even admitted he hadn't intended to tell Tommy at all. If he was honest with himself, that was hurting and confusing Tommy far more than any of the other questions going around in his head.

Yet again Tommy felt that he'd ended up with more questions than answers. Questions were all he seemed to have lately he realised.

**AN2: Thanks for sticking with me this far, hope you're still enjoying it. As always please follow and fav - and review, reviews are golden to me! Thank you!**


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: Ok so this is a mini chapter and the only one that doesn't actually have Tommy in it (just referred to) - but I hope that it will make sense why and you will like it.**

**Disclaimer: Still don't own - if I did Tommy wouldn't have died!**

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><p><em>Yet again Tommy felt that he'd ended up with more questions than answers. Questions were all he seemed to have lately he realised.<em>

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_**Diggle's POV**_

Diggle could see that Tommy was struggling with why Oliver hadn't trusted him, but knew that Tommy had no idea how to bring it up with Oliver. Equally it seemed that Oliver was clueless about what it was that was bugging Tommy so much. After a few days of this he decided that enough was enough. Apparently it was time for a talk with Oliver.

"So, what are you going to do about Tommy?" Diggle asked whilst he and Oliver were sparring. He'd figured that this was the best time to get Oliver to open up and listen - after all it was whilst they were sparring that he had first mentioned Yao Fei and getting a scar from him.

"Do about him, why, is something wrong?" Oliver asked confused.

Diggle had to smother a groan. For a man that was so highly attuned to every sense and everything going on around him Oliver could be truly clueless at times! It would appear this was another one of those times and he suspected he may have his work cut out for him.

"You do know he struggling right?! He doesn't understand why you didn't tell him who you are until you were forced to." Diggle figured if he was going to have to spell the whole thing out then he might as well do it from the start. No point dragging this out after all.

"It was for his protection. When people know my secret then they are put at risk. Tommy knows that." Oliver responded matter of factly.

"Does he? Have you actually told him that Oliver?"

After a minute of no answer being forthcoming Diggle decided to take the silence as a no. Oliver was clearly bothered by what he'd said as he'd managed to nearly land a couple of hits on Oliver with the batons that would never normally have even got close. Diggle decided to take this as a sign to continue.

"Oliver you and Tommy are like brothers yet you didn't trust him with your biggest secret. Can't you see how that must feel to him? He thinks you don't trust him, that you are closer to Felicity and me now than you are to him."

"Why would he think that, he knows he's my best friend." Oliver answered, thinking that Digg must be exaggerating, though he couldn't see why he would, Digg wasn't prone to exaggeration after all.

"Oliver he might be your best friend, but when people fight together they form a bond, become brothers-in-arms. That bond is what you, Felicity, and I have, and Tommy can clearly see that!" Diggle was starting to get really exasperated with how obstinate and obtuse Oliver was being! At least he knew that Oliver was listening as he continued to be able to both land and dodge more blows than was normal, proving that Oliver wasn't focusing on their sparring. "I _know_ you understand that Oliver!"

"That doesn't change anything between me and Tommy though, I've known him since we were kids." Oliver insisted.

Diggle was quick to notice that yet again Oliver said 'since they were kids' instead of 'all his life' just as he always seemed to when talking about someone who'd known pre-island Oliver. He couldn't help but wonder if Oliver was even aware that he did that. That was definitely a discussion for another day though.

"So tell him man, talk to him! He needs to know that there is still a place for him in your life now that he knows who you really are and not just the playboy facade. Why not bring him into the Team more now that he knows, let him be a part of this?"

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

**Oliver's POV**

As much as he hated to admit it Oliver knew that Digg was right. Tommy _was_ struggling and did seem a bit lost and unsure of himself around him since he'd found out just who he was. Maybe they _did_ need to have another talk after all, much as he hated to have those kind of talks. He knew he sucked at the emotional stuff, Felicity had pointed that out to him very clearly enough times after all - as had Thea!

Also, Digg had a good point - Tommy knowing could be useful. He might not have wanted to tell Tommy his secret but now that he had he saw no reason why they couldn't use Tommy to help with the cover stories and provide an alibi for Oliver being at the club. There was _no_ way he was going to let Tommy be put at risk though by actually fighting or anything! Thankfully he didn't think Tommy would want to anyway. Oliver also hoped that by giving Tommy a role within the Team they would be able to put off at least some of the emotional stuff for another day.

Oliver knew that Tommy still had a lot of questions. Maybe it was time he answered a few more of them, just not too many he hoped.

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><p><strong>AN2: Sorry this is such a short chapter! Please stick with the story and let me know what you think, thank you! Reviews are golden and food for the Muse :)<strong>


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: Sorry for the delay everybody, it's been a mad week in the 'real world'. Hope you like this chapter and it makes up for the delays. Thanks as ever go to my wonderful beta Rennie75, thank you sweet!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except the mistakes - those are all mine :)**

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><p><em>Oliver knew that Tommy still had a lot of questions. Maybe it was time he answered a few more of them, just not too many he hoped.<em>

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_**Tommy's POV**_

Tommy was upstairs in Verdant sitting at the bar going over the books when Oliver came up to him. He could see from Oliver's face that he wanted to talk and was surprised as that was something he normally avoided wherever possible – one thing at least that was still the same about his friend both before and after the island. Maybe this would be a good time to see if he would answer some more questions he mused. But first he would listen and see what it was Oliver wanted to say.

_**Oliver's POV**_

Oliver saw Tommy look up as he came over to him at the bar after coming up from the lair into Verdant itself. He didn't really know where to start, but Digg had made some good points the other day and he'd been unable to get them out of his mind ever since. He might not like this stuff, but he was not going to back away from Tommy when he needed him. He took a deep breath as he walked over to Tommy and took the seat next to him. He thought about getting a drink but quickly dismissed the thought. That was something the old him would have done, but he knew better now. It might not necessarily be easier to talk with a clear head – but it was definitely easier to think with one and that was something he needed right now.

"So, it's been pointed out to me that you might have some more questions ..." Oliver started by saying "... and that I might not have been that fair to you by not telling you until I was forced to."

_**Tommy's POV**_

Wow, Oliver admitting (sort of) that he was wrong about something – he didn't think he'd seen that happen since he'd come back, and probably not many times before either!

"Well I'd be lying if I said I wasn't confused by it. We were best friends and yet you didn't trust me, why?!" Tommy said, trying (only somewhat successfully) to keep the hurt and annoyance out of his voice. He knew that Oliver would probably pick up on it though, Oliver was _way_ too aware of things like that now!

_**Oliver's POV**_

"Trust?" Oliver queried. "It was nothing to do with trust Tommy, I was trying to keep you safe! I never planned to tell anyone, I was going to do all this on my own." Oliver gestured down to the lair vaguely as he said that, hoping the gesture would encompass what he meant by 'all this'.

He could see from Tommy's body language and tone of voice that he was upset and also annoyed. Maybe Digg had been more right about this than he'd wanted to accept or admit. But now that Tommy knew there was no going back, so it was time to move forward and to do that he needed Tommy to understand just _why_ he'd kept him in the dark.

"These people that I take on, they're bad people, dangerous people and they wouldn't hesitate to use someone I care about to get to me. I can't risk putting you, any of you – Mom, Thea, Laurel, Walter even – in that kind of danger. I thought I'd lost everyone and everything that was dear to me on that Island. I've been given a second chance now and I am _not_ going to risk that, risk you, by telling anyone who I am!" Oliver stated vehemently.

"Sounds kind of lonely to me, planning to do this on your own, not telling your friends or family." Tommy said quietly.

"It is, but it's worth it to keep you all safe" Oliver insisted.

_**Tommy's POV**_

Oliver was actually letting his emotions show through as he talked. Tommy wasn't sure he'd seen such emotion from him apart from when he'd talked about his scars, so it was clear just how deeply Oliver felt about what he was saying. He remembered how Felicity had balled him out about not noticing all the new scars Oliver had, maybe she hadn't just meant physical scars.

"Okay, I guess I can kind of see that." Tommy allowed. "But why did you tell Diggle and Felicity then if that was your plan."

"I had to tell Diggle in order to save his life. He was shot with a bullet coated in poison, curare – like your Father."

"So that's how you knew about the poison, the curare, and what to do about it?" Tommy queried.

"Yes."

"So, what, you gave him a blood transfusion too? You gave him your blood?

"No, I didn't know his blood type and couldn't risk making a mistake. I have these herbs, from the Island. Yao Fei used them to heal me after he shot me with that arrow. They have some amazing healing properties so I used them on Diggle as an antidote to the poison."

As surprised as he was by that, Tommy actually had Oliver talking and answering questions for once so he wasn't going to stop now. "And Felicity? She told me she saved _your_ life but why'd you go to her though?"

"Felicity _did_ save my life. My mother shot the Vigilante, shot me, at QC. I knew I wasn't going to make it back to the lair on my own so I climbed into the back of her car at QC. She had already helped me out unknowingly with a few things at that point so I knew I could trust her to do as I asked and bring me back here."

"Unknowingly?! Oliver as I've said before I may be blonde but I'm not _that_ blonde!" Felicity chimed in making Tommy jump with surprise. He hadn't heard her come in but clearly Oliver had as yet again he hadn't reacted in any way or shown any sign of surprise when she spoke. Just how _did_ he do that?

"The first time I met Oliver he brought me a laptop covered in bullet holes and said he'd spilt a latte on it! He sucks at cover stories and Diggle's not much better!" Felicity stated firmly.

Tommy couldn't help laughing at that, Oliver had always been bad at cover stories and apparently that hadn't changed either.

"Which is why we need you Tommy." Oliver said.

Tommy stopped laughing suddenly. "Wait, what?!" That was _not_ what he'd expected Oliver to say. The Vigilante needed him? He hadn't thought that Oliver in Vigilante mode needed anything other than what Diggle and Felicity already provided.

"Felicity is right, cover stories are not my strong point..."

"Ha, hangover cure in a syringe?!" Felicity butted in sarcastically.

Tommy was completely bemused by that one but decided to leave that question for later.

"...so as you were always better at them than me I was hoping you'll agree to be a part of this and help cover for me. I'm sure you've noticed how I keep disappearing or being late – questions are being raised already and Thea is suspicious, it's only getting worse..." Oliver's voice tailed off at that point.

"What Oliver is _trying_ to say is that you're the Manager of his Club so it would only be reasonable for you to need to have meetings with him here in private to discuss things, or to call him in the middle of the night with a problem or something." Felicity finished and it didn't take Oliver's ninja senses for Tommy to figure out that she was fed up with Oliver's attempts at explaining things so had decided to take over for him. In fact, from the small amount of time he'd been around it appeared that she did this a lot and that Oliver never seemed to object. Mind you, considering how scary he now knew her to be Tommy wasn't that surprised. Apparently even 'the Vigilante' was still scared of some things - or some people!

Still, at least for once Tommy could say that he had actually managed to get more answers than questions - even if he wasn't completely sure as yet what to do about those answers.

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><p><strong>AN2: So, hope you liked it. I'm not really sure where to go from here of whether to continue with this or not. Opinions and suggestions very welcome :) Please fav, follow, and review :D<strong>


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: Sorry for the big delay in this, real life got in the way in a pretty big style but that's not important now. Thank you so much for all the reviews – you guys sure know how to make a new writer feel welcome. Sorry as well that this is a very short chapter, hope you like it though!**

**Disclaimer: I still own nothing - if I did Tommy would be alive and we'd have far more Olicity (& salmon ladder)!**

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><p><em>Still, at least for once Tommy could say that he had actually managed to get more answers than questions – even if he wasn't completely sure as yet what to do about those answers.<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

Tommy had been completely taken by surprise by Felicity's explanation of what they wanted him to do for Team Arrow – by Oliver saying that they wanted him to be a part of it all. It had taken him a while to think about that one as he didn't know just how much he wanted to be involved. He'd gone back to Oliver the next day though after thinking about it for most of that (sleepless) night.

Tommy went down into the Arrowcave and found Oliver there training, on his own this time though thankfully. He'd stopped as Tommy came down the stairs though.

"Oliver, I don't understand a lot of what's going on here – you haven't even told me where you get the names of the people you go after from, Felicity mentioned something about a list? But anyone can see that you _do_ suck at cover stories so yes, I will help cover for you. But that's it. I don't want to get into anything else – it's not as if I can fight or anything anyway!"

"Thank you. That's all I want, besides I know that what you're like in a fight hasn't improved much. Remember, going to Max Fuller's club proved that!" Oliver replied jokingly, determined to keep things light-hearted for once.

"Hey, I thought we agreed _never_ to speak of that again!" Tommy was still humiliated by the fact that Laurel had rescued the pair of them when Max had turned his bouncers on them. Although, now he thought of it … "Why didn't you fight those guys properly anyway – then Laurel wouldn't have had to completely embarrass us like that by 'rescuing' us?!"

"The Vigilante had already appeared just after I returned, and the first report of him was when we were attacked after all, I couldn't risk anyone knowing that I knew how to fight properly now and putting it together."

Tommy had to admit to the sense of that. Mind you, Oliver clearly hadn't been that successful at hiding that co-incidence as Detective Lance had ended up arresting him for being the Vigilante after all! At that thought even more questions came to him though – hadn't Oliver been let off because the Vigilante had been seen over the other side of town or something at the same time as his party? Yet another thing for him to ask Oliver about, another time though.

Yet again Tommy found himself admitting that this at least was one area Oliver _definitely_ still needed help with. He had always had to come up with their cover stories when they were younger – time to resume that job now it appeared. He just hoped that he would be more successful at it than it seemed Oliver had been so far – even if he _had_ got away with being arrested and somehow then got the case dropped! Maybe by doing this, by being a part of Team Arrow in this little way, he would be able to get answers to some of the rest of his questions without raising more for a change. Answers, that's what he needed know, not questions.

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><p><strong>AN2: That's it folks, I'm leaving this story here. I do plan to write a follow on fic though going from here and have no intention of Tommy dying in my world. I will post a final AN on here when I start that fic though so you can see what it's called and read if you want to. Thank you all so very much for reading, following, faving, and reviewing – and sticking with me through this my first ever fic! It means so much to me! Final thanks however have to go to my wonderful Beta Rennie75 who got me into this writing lark and has stuck with me and kept me going even when our Muse was being stubborn, thank you sweetheart!<strong>


	7. Chapter 7

**AN: Yeah okay, I know I said that this story was 'complete' but apparently the Muse had other ideas :) Let me know what you think please. Reviews are the lifeblood of us writers hint hint lol :) Big thanks as always to my wonderful Beta Rennie75 - including for all the help with Americanisms hehe, all mistakes are still mine though!**

**Disclaimer: I still don't own it, wish I did, but I don't.**

It had been a long few weeks since Tommy had agreed to help with the cover stories, something he'd managed better than anyone (himself included) had expected. He'd even risked life & limb by breaking the other cardinal rule (Never touch Felicity's babies) when he'd cleared the Arrowcave just in time to get out before Detective Lance turned up with a search warrant! Later Diggle and Oliver had made it clear (in their own way) how impressed they were by him taking such a risk with Felicity in order to protect Oliver's secret - clearly he'd earned some bonus points there!

Still though, he had been surprised when Oliver called him for help getting back to the 'cave after he'd been injured on Arrow business. He'd gone to get him straight away of course and brought him back safely. But once he saw that the 'slight injury' Oliver had mentioned was actually a bullet wound - well he couldn't help but ask why Oliver had called him instead of Diggle?! It wasn't as if he had any medical training after all!

"Oliver you've been shot! You need help let me call Diggle!" Tommy tried to keep the worry from his voice, but he had NO idea what he was supposed to do. Diggle had planned to give him some medical training but they'd yet to actually get that far - a fact he was seriously regretting right now.

"No it's only slight, I don't need help. Besides he's out with Carly, I don't want to interrupt them."

"Oliver, you've been _shot_! I know you think you're invincible but in what world does a bullet inside you count as '_slight_'!" Tommy tried somewhat unsuccessfully to keep the rising hysteria out of his voice. "At least let me call Felicity!"

"It's nothing." Oliver insisted calmly "I've had far worse believe me and Felicity doesn't do too well with blood or needles. Besides, I'm much better at sewing now than I was the first time I had to dig a bullet out of myself."

Much as he was relieved to hear that he wasn't the only one who wasn't great on the medical side; Tommy still didn't know whether he was more annoyed, upset, or impressed with Oliver for being so calm about this. Oliver had continued to grab the bits he'd needed whilst talking, only stopping briefly to ask Tommy to pass the gauze and the long nose tweezers. He knew Oliver didn't like anaesthetic_,_ but looking at the tweezers he hadn't been able to stop himself offering to get some.

"You know I don't use that." Oliver replied seemingly bemused that Tommy had even queried it.

"Oliver, you may be surprised by this but you are actually human - and digging a bullet out of your ankle is going to _hurt_!" Tommy retorted angrily, Oliver was going to drive him crazy at this rate. He didn't care what he said, how could he seriously be considering removing a bullet from himself without even a Tylenol_?!_ Yet much to his amazement Oliver had sat down and proceeded to do just that!

Oliver must have noticed how pale Tommy was as he'd started talking whilst working on removing the bullet. "The first time I was shot was about a year after I'd got to the Island. We'd been attacked and I was captured by a man I later found out was called Professor Ivo. I was locked in a cell on this old freighter ship and then I was shot in my side and collapsed. When I came round a bit the man in the cell next to me told me they do that to all the prisoners to see who's strong. He told me 'Life is not for the weak' and explained that I was expected to dig it out myself. A pair of tweezers and a needle and thread had been left in a kidney dish just outside the bars." Oliver paused then to catch his breath before pulling the current bullet out of his ankle with a grimace of pain.

Tommy still couldn't quite believe what he was seeing, or hearing for that matter. Was Oliver actually sharing about his time on the island - and one of his scars - voluntarily?

Oliver started talking again once he'd threaded the needle and started sewing. "I wasn't sure that I could do it, but knew that to 'survive' was the most important thing, so if I wanted to survive I had no choice. I was bleeding too much to wait around for anything else and nobody was about to help me. So this really is nothing Tommy, I just didn't want to drive until I'd removed the bullet. See all done and much neater than this one!" Oliver said with a slight smile as he finished, pulling his jacket and top out the way so that Tommy could see the scar from that first bullet as well.

Much as he hated to admit it, Oliver clearly had become a lot better at sewing. That first scar was a mess whereas the one he'd just finished sewing was _much_ neater. Tommy didn't want to think about just how much practice Oliver must have had at sewing up his own wounds to improve this much. It seemed like there was no limit to the amount of 'skills' Oliver had picked up on that island - or the ship too apparently!

Still, yet again, Tommy had ended up with answers instead of just more questions and this time he hadn't even gone looking for them. He still wasn't keen on the idea of Oliver digging bullets out of himself though and had a feeling it was going to take a lot more time before he was used to that! He couldn't help but feel pleased that Oliver had come to him and even opened up to him though. Maybe, just maybe, their friendship would get back to being as strong as it used to be.


	8. Chapter 8

**AN: Apparently the Muse is in the mood for me to write at the moment, so if anyone has any plot bunnies they want to put forward now would be a good time :) Even more thanks than normal to my wonderful friend & beta Rennie75 - apparently writing at gone midnight on my touchscreen isn't the best plan unless you want to end up with a lot of mixed tenses & missed words lol! Thank you Rennie!**

**Disclaimer: Same as ever - still not mine, if they were then the UK would not be so far behind the US on seeing the episodes!**

**Tommy's POV**

After they had been attacked at Laurel's flat by Rasmus' men Tommy's first thought had been to go to the Queen Mansion - after all who better to protect the child (and Laurel) than the Vigilante?! It wasn't until after he'd convinced Detective Lance though that he stopped to think and realise what risks that might pose for protecting Oliver's identity. He just hoped Felicity's kind heart would be concerned enough about the boy to overrule her anger at him for risking that identity! He decided it would be safer to let Oliver tell her rather than do it himself - after all he had yet to forget being on the receiving end of her wrath and had no intention of repeating the experience if he could help it! He just hoped that all that security would be enough to dissuade the attacker from going after them there - after all, like he'd said to Detective Lance, the Queens really _do_ have more security than the President ...

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Of course things hadn't gone that smoothly - one thing Tommy was fast learning was that things never went that smoothly for Team Arrow. In fact he was starting to wonder why they even bothered with Plan A as they always ended up reverting to Plan B, or even Plans C or D for that matter. Felicity had at least forgiven him for putting Oliver's identity at risk - after a _lot_ of angry glares, which he suspected weren't going to go anywhere any time soon.

But the hitman had still come for them. He remembered the fear he'd felt when the power had gone out and Oliver's face had given enough of a flicker for him to pick up that he'd been lying to Laurel about it just being a_n_ old house. Apparently Laurel hadn't picked up on the lie though, much to his surprise - maybe he really was getting to know post-Island Oliver a lot better than he'd thought.

Laurel _also_ hadn't picked up on how fast he'd obeyed Oliver's orders either - for that's how he thought of them. The minute the power had gone out Oliver had subtly changed become the Vigilante in an instant and therefore whatever he said had become an order that _Tommy_ he wouldn't think of debating. That hadn't stopped him being worried about Oliver being out there fighting a _hitman_ - somebody who was being paid to kill them! He had rapidly discovered just how different staying in the 'cave and listening to missions over the comms (and that was bad enough) was to actually being in the same building! Knowing that his friend was out there fighting an hitman no less to protect their lives - and worse still Oliver was unarmed and had none of his gear or disguise.

He assumed that Felicity would take care of any security footage (apparently there was nothing she couldn't do with computers). Still, there were other people in the Mansion and any one of them could come the wrong way at the wrong time. Being discovered could be the least of Oliver's worries, what if somebody distracted him at the wrong moment?!

He could still remember hearing the sounds of fighting and things crashing. Laurel had wanted to go out there, to look for Oliver and he'd struggled to hold her back. Tommy remembered the sound of something breaking as Oliver had shut the door after them, he just hoped that sound meant that he'd broken the lock or something keeping Laurel safe. Tommy had had to remind her that she had to protect the boy, he was why they were there after all and it would all be for nothing if the boy was hurt. He couldn't help but wonder where Diggle was and why he wasn't out there helping Oliver.

The longer it went on the worse his nerves had become and he hadn't been sure how much more he could take. If Tommy hadn't been so aware of how any distraction could actually put Oliver at more risk he might have given in and gone out there himself. However, that would have meant disobeying Oliver's orders whilst he was in Vigilante mode. Worse, if it turned out that he _did_ actually endanger Oliver then there was no way Felicity would let him live and he was far more scared of her than he was of Oliver - in any mode! (He'd had a sneaking suspicion he wasn't the only one who felt that way either, especially going on the respect he'd gained from Diggle and Oliver after risking her wrath by moving her computers.)

Finally, after what seemed like hours but had only been minutes, it had all been over. The hitman was dead and Oliver had spun Detective Lance some story about the security guard saving him by stabbing the hitman with the poker. (Even though Tommy had known full well it was actually Oliver who'd done that.) He had chipped in by saying that the guard had been a real hero to back-up Oliver's story. He knew that Oliver would understand he was really saying that _Oliver_ was the hero, which was probably the closest Oliver would ever allow him to get to saying it for real.

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Tommy had fast realised that Felicity had been right - Oliver didn't stop to think about the risk to himself, simply doing whatever was needed to protect others, making him a real hero in his book. It was strange, when he thought about it, just how much his own views on that had changed in what was really quite a short period of time. He remembered thinking that Oliver was a murderer when he'd first found he was the Vigilante. Yet here he was now, not only knowing that Oliver was actually a hero but also intending to do all he could to make Oliver realise it too. Tommy knew that Oliver didn't see himself that way though and wondered just what it would take to get that through to him. Somehow he suspected it would not be an easy task, but one that he was determined to undertake, hopefully assisted by Felicity and Diggle.

Tommy was still stunned by just what Oliver had been capable of doing when he didn't even have anything with him or any time to prep himself. It appeared his previous thoughts about the sheer amount of skills Oliver had mastered on the Island was correct, but that meant the dread and concern he felt about just what his friend must have been through was only increased. It would soon be time to sit down and talk to Oliver again he suspected. Tommy just hoped that Oliver would be in the mood to talk and answer some of those questions.

**AN2: As ever please please do follow/fav/review & let me know what you think, I live for your comments/reviews! Thank you!**


	9. Chapter 9

**AN: OK so this is the way I would have liked this to go in the series and is my take on it mistakes are mine & thanks to Rennie75 for being my beta & giving me some ideas on how to take this forward :)**

**Disclaimer: Still not mine, this show belongs to CW.**

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><p><em><strong>Tommy's POV<strong>_

Tommy couldn't believe it. He was stunned. How could it be true? But one look at Oliver's face, his body language, told him that it was. It was true. How could it be true?

He'd been going to the lair to see if Felicity would tell him what was going on between Diggle and Oliver because _something_ clearly was, despite Oliver insisting it was nothing. But instead he found Oliver slumped on the floor looking utterly dejected and more lost than he thought he could ever remember seeing him. The fact that Oliver hadn't even seemed to register him coming in scared him too - he didn't expect Felicity to necessarily hear him; but Oliver, Oliver heard _everything_! Oliver was talking quietly to Felicity but Tommy still heard what Oliver was saying, much as he now wished that wasn't the case.

It was bad enough discovering that Walter had not just disappeared but in fact had actually been abducted - but this?! His stomach was doing a real number on him and he felt sick. His father - _his father - _had been the one to abduct him! Not only that but Moira had been complicit in the abduction, in abducting her own husband. He suspected that he looked just about as lost as Oliver right now. HIS FATHER! How?! Why? What the hell was going on?!

Yet again it felt as if his life was reverting to being full of questions. For the first time he could remember he was not only speechless, but had no idea what to think, what to feel. How could this be happening - his father?! All he could hear was the words Oliver had said to Felicity playing over and over in his head.

Oliver got up off the floor following Felicity to the computers, Oliver's movement must have shocked him back into the life, but all he could say was one word.

"Why?"

_**Oliver's POV**_

Oliver looked at Tommy in despair. "Tommy. I wish you had never heard that. I didn't want you to know, to have to deal with this too."

"But now I do. Oliver what the hell is going on?!"

He just kept looking at Tommy. How was he supposed to tell his best friend that his father was the Dark Archer? That Merlyn - and apparently his mother - were involved in an undertaking but that they still had no idea what the undertaking actually was?

_**Felicity's POV**_

Felicity looked at the pair of them and her heart despaired for the pain that they were both going through right now. She wished she could fix this, make it better somehow, but knew that she couldn't. Maybe though there was a way to help Walter still ...

_**Oliver's POV**_

"Your father, Tommy ..." Oliver took a deep breath, not really having a clue how to continue. "... he's done some bad things. You remember I told you that my father said he wasn't the man I thought he was, well your father isn't either. He's ... Tommy he's the other archer."

_**Tommy's POV**_

"What!" Tommy felt like he was in some weird surreal world, none of this was making any sense. His father - the Dark Archer, no, he couldn't be! But looking at his friend's face he knew it was somehow true. He took a few steps back, stumbling slightly, before finding himself leaning heavily against Oliver's workbench.

_**Felicity's POV**_

"Yes!" Felicity said loudly - not quite shouting as she usually would, but still victorious. "Your mom, that phone call she made Mr_._ Merlyn make, I traced it and found where it was coming from, Bludhaven." She was utterly relieved that not only had she found something, but she'd been able to interrupt what was clearly a very painful and awkward conversation on all parts - and one that was probably best shelved for later (and preferably when she wasn't going to be a third wheel in the way). She made a note to remind Oliver that ice-cream often helped although she wasn't sure if that was just her or girls in general but if it was her then it would have to be mint choc but then again maybe Oliver preferred something else...

"Felicity" Oliver said pointedly looking at her as if it wasn't the first time he'd said something. Great, she was babbling in her thoughts now too! Just what she needed.

"Did you manage to find where in Bludhaven it came from?" Oliver asked.

"Yes of course I did, it came from this tenement building. It's supposed to be abandoned, but the energy grid doesn't agree."

"Can you bring up a satellite image please?" He asked.

"Woh, that's a lot of security for an abandoned building." She stated worriedly.

_**Tommy's POV**_

"Do you think that's where they are holding Walter?" Tommy queried. He was still stunned about his father and trying to take that in. But if Oliver could shelve his feelings about his mother's involvement for now to focus on finding Walter, then he was damn sure he wasn't going to do any less. After all, apparently his father was the reason that Walter had disappeared (not disappeared, been abducted his brain commented) for six months and he wasn't going to do anything to get in the way of Oliver rescuing him. Their conversation could wait, would have to wait, until _after_ Walter was safe. Looking at the satellite images though, he had no idea how Oliver was going to get him out.

"There's no way in!" Felicity said sounding scared, apparently she had been thinking the same thing as he had.

"Yes there is, the roof." Oliver bluntly replied.

"Yeah because there's no way to get up there, there's no other buildings to jump from. You'd have to jump out of something."

"I have something." Oliver stated in a very determined voice before turning to gear up.

Felicity exchanged a look with Tommy. "What?! Don't look at me, I have no idea what he's going to do!" Tommy said somewhat defensively with his hands up to demonstrate that he had nothing to do with whatever hairbrained scheme Oliver had come up with this time. He was still more scared of Felicity than Oliver and had no intention of letting her think that he was anything to do with Oliver's latest mad (and probably very dangerous) idea.

Oliver had walked out the lair then all geared up and hadn't stopped to tell them what he was going to do, just simply telling Felicity to monitor the comms and satellite images. Tommy had no intention of going anywhere either though so he stayed with Felicity.

"Paragliding?! When did Oliver learn to paraglide?" Felicity asked him with the comms muted.

"First I knew of it - besides you probably know more of what he can do now than I do." Tommy responded in a light-hearted voice trying (and failing) to relieve some of the concern and tension Felicity was clearly displaying.

After that she had reactivated the comms and they both stayed quiet as they listened to sounds of a fierce and clearly one-sided battle going on. All they could see from the satellite was muzzle flashes, but it appeared that angering and threatening Oliver or his family when he was in Vigilante mode was a _really bad_ _idea_! However this time, Tommy felt no sympathy whatsoever for those Oliver was fast dispatching - they were getting what they deserved as far as he was concerned.

For a change Oliver actually managed to get out with Walter without seeming to incur any injuries himself or needing a Plan B. It was weird hearing Oliver speak to Walter with the voice-changer active and calling him Mr_._Steele, but Tommy knew that Oliver had to protect his identity. Besides, it appeared that Walter would have enough to deal with without learning his stepson was the Vigilante too - a feeling Tommy could truly sympathise with. He had as yet still been unable to stop the mantra of 'my father, _my father_' going round and round in his head. Questions, so many questions, and this time he _knew_ he wasn't going to like any of the answers.

**AN2: Please tell me what you think and don't forget to follow/fav/review - shameless plug asking for reviews lol :D Thank you for sticking with me and this fic!**


	10. Chapter 10

**AN: OK, this chapter is the first part of several that I will be posting them pretty close together so as not to keep you lovely readers waiting! They are in response to prompts in reviews from TheOddManOut and Rennie75 on what they would like to see next so these are for you, hope you enjoy...**

**AN2: Even more thanks than normal to my dear friend and beta Rennie75 for putting up with my meandering thoughts here and helping me get this down the way I wanted to - sorry for making even you wait on a cliff-hanger at one point honey, the Muse just wouldn't co-operate!**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, everything belongs to the CW, I'm just playing in their sandpit.**

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><p><em>He had as yet still been unable to stop the mantra of 'my father, <em>my father_' going round and round in his head. Questions, so many questions, and this time he _knew _he wasn't going to like any of the answers._

_**Tommy's POV**_

Now that Walter was out of hospital and safely back at home Tommy figured that a certain conversation with Oliver was more than overdue. It was clear the Oliver had known way more than he'd let on about this 'undertaking' - whatever the hell that was - and it was about time he talked! _No more hiding stuff_Tommy thought angrily, this concerned his father just as much as it did Oliver's mother and that meant he had _every_ right to know exactly what was going on! This time he was determined there would be no more evasions or subject changes ... at least that's what he'd been thinking right up until he entered the 'cave...

"You said you were going to pull your punches?!" Felicity said to Diggle angrily.

"I did" Diggle replied.

"Let me get you an icepack for - everything."

"I'm fine" Oliver said softly. But as Tommy continued down the stairs and Oliver came into view he disagreed with that comment. Tommy could see Oliver limping over to sit on the bench while Felicity grabbed an ice-pack for his face. Now what had happened - and more to the point how on earth was it that Oliver seemed to be the injured one whilst Diggle was fine? Pulling punches? What was that all about? Great, more questions, just what he needed!

_"What happened to you?" Tommy asked figuring it was wise to find out what had gone on before launching Oliver himself, especially going by the look on Felicity's face!_

Oliver explained that they had decided it was time they got some straight answers from Moira and so they'd agreed that the Vigilante - read Diggle - would capture him and his mom from the mansion and interrogate them. Apparently Diggle had _even _hurt Oliver in order to make Moira talk which, despite the look of anger on Felicity's face, had all been part of the plan. Tommy spared a fleeting thought for Diggle - Oliver might be the one who had been hit, but Diggle was the recipient of that _look_, a look he had been very careful to ensure was never aimed his way again after that first conversation with Felicity.

"So did you?" He asked pointedly.

"Did we what?" Oliver replied somewhat wearily.

"Get some answers!" Tommy said rather angrily. Despite the latest injuries Oliver was now sporting he was still determined to get some answers out of him and at least now Tommy didn't need to find a way to bring the conversation up - even if he had planned on talking to Oliver in private.

"See for yourself." Felicity said turning and walking over to her computers. She brought up the video of the 'interrogation' and they all watched in silence. Tommy couldn't help wincing and glancing sideways at Oliver when it got the point where Diggle had hit him hard enough to knock Oliver and the chair over onto the floor. No wonder Felicity wasn't too thrilled with Diggle and had given Oliver an ice-pack, even if he'd now discarded it. All thoughts of pulled punches and ice-packs fast left him though when he heard Moira telling The Diggle Vigilante about the earthquake machine.

"No! He couldn't, he wouldn't! No! She's lying, she must be! It's not true, he wouldn't!"

Oliver stopped him with four simple words "Look at her face."

Tommy took a few deep breaths as he looked at her. He didn't want to believe it, still couldn't, wouldn't believe his father was capable of _that_! But her face - she wasn't lying - was too scared of what the Vigilante might do to Oliver to lie. Still, he wasn't ready to accept it was true yet either.

"Just because she believes it's true doesn't mean it actually is! My father might be a lot of things - but he's not a murderer, he couldn't _kill_ anyone! He could see the tiny flicker pain in Oliver's face and realized that he had said almost the same words he'd previously used to accuse Oliver, but right now he didn't care about that. He was too angry. How could they believe this was true? How could _Oliver_ believe it?! "My father might be a lot of things Oliver but not this!

"It's the truth Tommy, and he can kill - we know that he has killed. _You_ know that he can kill, you saw him do that the night of the Award Ceremony." Oliver reminded him softly but firmly.

"It's true" Diggle added. "He's the one who put Oliver in the hospital at Christmas."

"What?!" This was ridiculous, things were fast spiralling way out of his control and he had no way to stop it. Oliver was right about the Award Ceremony, but this?! He'd seen the state that Oliver had been in - he'd had a pneumothorax for goodness sake, there's _no way_ his father could have done that to his best friend!

"He didn't know it was me Tommy, he doesn't know who the Vigilante is."

_Great, now add mind-reader to Oliver's already stupidly long list of ninja skills_._ Just what he needed._ Tommy thought angrily.

"That still doesn't mean it was him - how do you even know that the Dark Archer is my father anyway?" Tommy asked the question that he'd come here meaning to ask in the first place.

"The phone call." Felicity responded much to his surprise, he'd expected Oliver to answer him, not her. "When I hacked - not hacked traced hacked is such an ugly word don't you think - anyway when I traced backwards before finding the signal that was what I used to find out where Walter was being held I was able to find records of previous calls had made too and they prove it Tommy. I'm so sorry." She finished sympathetically.

Tommy wished it hadn't have been Felicity. Oliver he could have argued with, even Diggle too to an extent - but how could he argue with Felicity and what her computers had found? Even if he had wanted to argue with this woman who somehow remained so pure despite what Oliver had dragged her into, his sense of self-preservation was too strong to go up against her concerning her 'babies'. No matter how much he wanted to believe it, he knew that she wouldn't have been wrong about this. Still, though that didn't mean he was ready to accept it - let alone this thing about the earthquake machine.

"That doesn't prove that she's right, that Moira's right about this machine even if she _believes_ she was telling the truth. I mean an earthquake machine - does that even exist?" He asked turning to Felicity as he said asked that last.

"I don't know to be honest, but there have been some worrying reports about seismic manipulation coming out of Unidac Industries. Oliver, that's the company that Queen Consolidated purchased when..." Felicity trailed off at that point for some unknown reason. Tommy was getting used to Felicity babbling now, but trailing off unstopped, that wasn't like her.

"When Lawton shot me." Diggle finished bluntly. Ah, thought Tommy, now it made sense, no wonder Felicity had been reluctant to finish that sentence.

"Either way we need to find out, and that means we need more information. Tommy I have a job for you." Oliver stated.

_Me, wait, what?!_

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><p><strong>AN3: If you want to know what happens next you know what to do:- follow, fav, and review - pretty please :D<strong>


	11. Chapter 11

**AN: Huge, huge thanks to everyone who has reviewed, followed, or favourited this story. You have made a first time writer very, very happy indeed! Without you guys and my wonderful beta Rennie75 this fic would definitely not still be going, so thank you! OK, this chapter is the second part of these for you...**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, everything belongs to the CW, I'm just playing in their sandpit.**

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><p><em>Me, wait, what?!<em>

**Tommy's POV**

It turned out that the 'job' Oliver had for him was planting a bug in his father's office. While he was doing that Oliver, Diggle, and Felicity would be breaking in and implanting a virus straight into the Merlyn Global mainframe. For some reason it wasn't possible for Felicity to hack it remotely so a virus needed to be physically uploaded, she had explained it in a technical manner but he was pretty sure he wasn't the only one who hadn't followed the explanation.

Tommy was less than happy with this plan, but he had agreed on the basis that at least they would be able to get the information to prove that his father had _nothing_ to do with the plan to wipe out the Glades. After all, it was Queen Consolidated that had bought Unidac Industries – not Merlyn Global as he'd pointed out bluntly!

Oliver had agreed but it was clear that he didn't share Tommy's sentiments and nor did it change the plan. The Team split up to handle their respective business and Oliver had gone to see Thea as she'd sent him a text saying she needed to talk. Oliver had asked Felicity to prep the tech whilst he was gone. Diggle had also left saying he needed to change his plan with Carly and AJ for this evening. Tommy had left then too, needing some time to think.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Once the job was over with they had all met back at the lair as he'd taken to calling it now. Unsurprisingly a Plan B had been needed as his father had seen Oliver; and Felicity had nearly been caught out too. Thankfully they had all made it out of there in the end with the bug planted and the virus uploaded, so all in all he supposed it could have gone worse. Nobody was injured this time – even if Felicity had chosen a really bad time to discover she was afraid of heights!

The virus had paid dividends too – much to his dismay in many ways! Felicity had discovered not only that there _was_ an earthquake machine but had found the location of it, which is why they were all back here now. Oliver was ordering Diggle to steal the machine whilst he confronted Merlyn – but Tommy was less than happy with that!

"You might be willing to have an arrow point conversation with your own mother, but this is _my_ father and I get a say in this!" Tommy insisted angrily – to little effect. Both Diggle and Felicity had agreed with Oliver (little surprise there he thought bitterly) and Oliver had stormed out fully geared up refusing to listen to anything Tommy was saying.

"Oliver! I'm still talking to you! You can't just go after my father like that!" Tommy couldn't believe that Oliver was ignoring him and leaving whilst he was still talking! Oliver would _never_ have done that before the Island so how could he do it now?!

"Five years Tommy" Felicity said quietly after Diggle had quickly followed Oliver out to capture the machine.

"What?" He snapped angrily making her jump. He took a deep breath realising that this wasn't really Felicity's fault. "Sorry. What?" He said again, gentler this time.

"He was gone for five years Tommy, five years! We only know a tiny bit of what he went through in that time and what he has said is bad enough don't you think?"

She had a point. Much as it was hard for him to admit, she did have a point. Oliver had still said so little about what had happened and where so many of those scars were from. He sighed, it wasn't fair to judge him on who he used to be. He took another few deep breaths and nodded slowly knowing that Felicity understood he was acknowledging her.

They both went back over the computers and she activated the comms putting them on loud speaker so that Tommy could hear what was going on too. Both Diggle and Oliver confirmed they were at their respective locations but then everything started going wrong again, causing Tommy to wonder (not for the first time) why they even bothered to have a Plan A sometimes! The machine wasn't there, the warehouse was empty.

"No, wait, it can't be gone, the file said it was there!" Felicity insisted worriedly looking in horror at her computers as if they had betrayed her.

"Computer information can be out of date Felicity." Diggle responded, but then stopped as they could all hear sounds of a fight over the comms. A big fight and from the sound of it things weren't going Oliver's way.

Tommy couldn't help but feel conflicted. He didn't want Oliver to be hurt – but he didn't want his father hurt either! The sound kept crackling and breaking up, Felicity was trying to clear it back up but it wasn't working. Then just as she finally got it clear they heard a small explosion.

"Oliver, _Oliver_!" Felicity cried, but it was too late, Oliver's comms were dead. Tommy was stunned. He'd seen Oliver fight, how could anyone beat him – even this Dark Archer, regardless of whether or not that was his father?! Oh no! The last words Oliver had heard him say had been in anger – please don't let them be the _last_ words he got to say to his friend he thought panicking. Oliver would be okay, he had to be okay – didn't he? He looked at Felicity but her face gave him no comfort, she was just as concerned as he was.

"Oliver, Oliver respond!" Diggle kept trying to raise Oliver on the comms whilst racing to Merlyn Global to rescue him and find out what the heck had happened. Tommy knew Diggle was ex-Special Forces, but it was beyond him how the man could stay so calm?!

"He's not here."

"What?" Felicity and Tommy both answered at the same time.

"He's not here Felicity, neither of them are." Diggle answered and this time a small amount of concern could be heard in even his voice.

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><p><strong>AN2: Hope you liked, there is more to this coming up so please remember to follow, fav, and review! Thank you!<strong>


	12. Chapter 12

**AN: Please note this chapter contains mentions of (mild) torture – within the ranges of what's shown in the show. However, please exercise caution – especially if this is something you are sensitive to. Thank you! As ever big thanks go to Rennie75 for being such a great beta & helping me make sense of these mad chapters!**

**Disclaimer: Yeah I know, I know, still not mine, doh!**

_"He's not here Felicity, neither of them are." Diggle answered and this time a small amount of concern could be heard in even his voice._

**Oliver's POV**

Pain. The first thing he was aware of when he started to come round was pain. Oliver had learnt the very hard way that it was important to gain as much information as you can before letting your captors realise that you are now conscious. So while keeping his eyes shut and his body limp he used what Tommy had referred to as his 'ninja skills'. Water, he could hear water dripping, it was echoing but only a little bit, not enough to be deep underground or in a cave. Cold, the air around him was cold and a bit musty. He could smell something metallic in the air too – a warehouse, he was in an abandoned warehouse.

At that his pain upped a level as he became more aware of his body. He was hanging, suspended by his arms from a chain fixed high above him. His toes were barely scrapping the floor, not enough to take any of the pressure off his already protesting shoulder muscles. He could feel something warm running down his chest in several places, blood his mind identified. Merlyn had used a knife in the fight he remembered. He'd been so _fast_! Far faster than he had ever expected. But then, from the moment Merlyn had caught that arrow ('Where did he learn to do _that_?!') nothing had gone according to plan.

He knew that Merlyn would be a tough opponent, but somehow the thought that this was Tommy's father had kept running through his head and distracted him – Slade would be so disappointed he thought briefly. Still, though he had never expected that shock grenade and that had clearly been his big mistake. He just hoped it wouldn't prove to be a fatal mistake. Everything he knew of the Dark Archer – and being captured by anyone - told him not to expect any mercy and he tried to prepare himself for what would be coming next.

He catalogued his injuries as he opened his eyes knowing that the best way to make it through was to be totally aware of every injury. If you didn't then there was no way to switch off the pain and he knew he wouldn't be able to prepare and execute an escape unless he was aware of what he was still capable of doing. It seemed his injuries were fairly minor, so far. Pulled muscles in his shoulders, his left one was struggling more than the right due to the more recent scar tissue from being shot by his mother, and also from the pneumothorax he'd incurred the last time he went up against Merlyn.

Oliver was worried about Tommy and the Team. The last thing they would have heard was that explosion, what would they be thinking now? How was Tommy going to be dealing with this – it was his father Oliver had gone to confront after all. He knew he couldn't focus on that right now though. Tommy was back at the lair with Felicity so at least he knew he was safe. Diggle was safe too as the last thing Oliver had heard over the comms was him leaving that warehouse. He just had to trust that the Team would look after each other and couldn't help hoping that Felicity would find a way to trace where he was too. Oliver knew she would be working hard on that, but wasn't going to rely on it as Merlyn's defences had already proved to be extreme. He would have to plan his escape on the assumption that there would be no help coming.

Just then he heard a door bang and knew that must be Merlyn returning. He was unsure how this was going to go – until his capture Merlyn hadn't known who he was after all. Would his friendship with Tommy and the length of time they had all known each other count for anything; or would Merlyn's bitterness and experiences wherever it was that he had learned his fighting and archery skills dominate? It seemed he was about to find out.

Merlyn walked in wearing a sharp suit and holding himself like he was walking into a hostile takeover where he would be the one doing the takeover. The hostility just flowed off him in waves, it seemed the bitterness would be dominating this time.

"Well Oliver, it appears I am not the only one who has been hiding their real selves behind a front." Merlyn sounded so smug and pleased with himself, but underlying that was annoyance. It was clear that Merlyn didn't like anyone messing with his plans – a fact that had been shown clearly enough by Walter's abduction. Oliver couldn't help but be reminded of Fyres, something that worried him deeply.

Merlyn was holding an arrow, one of Oliver's green ones he noticed, and he could see the hilt of a knife sticking out of Merlyn's waistband too. Neither of which boded well but Oliver had faced swords before and knew he could face this too.

Merlyn dragged the arrowhead over Oliver's chest leaving shallow cuts behind as he went, whilst asking him questions wanting to know who Oliver was working with. Merlyn knew that there must be someone else helping him and was determined he was going to find out just _who_ that was. However, Oliver was equally determined that Merlyn was never going to find out. He would _never_ let him get at Felicity, no matter what Merlyn did to him!

Merlyn didn't give in easily either and as time went by Oliver started to weaken simply from the blood loss. Merlyn upped his game and the severity and depth of the injuries he inflicted increased when Oliver continued to remain stubbornly quiet. Multiple times Merlyn had used the arrowhead to stab him before pulling it back out and stabbing him again. He also used the knife on him, following the lines of Oliver's existing scars and asking questions about how Oliver had got them. Oliver recognised this for what it was though, Merlyn was simply trying to unnerve him in order to force him into making a mistake. What Merlyn didn't know however, was just _how many_ times Oliver had been interrogated and tortured – and by people who couldn't care less if he died. Merlyn might be willing to do an awful lot, but Oliver had noticed him hesitate just the slightest bit a few times, as if he was wary of how Tommy would react if Oliver died. This gave Oliver an edge and one he was more than willing to use.

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><p><strong>AN2: Thank you all so very much for your reviews, faves, &amp; follows! They mean the world to me and keep me writing :D xxx<strong>


	13. Chapter 13

**AN: Again please note this chapter contains mentions of (mild) torture – within the ranges of what's shown in the show. However, please exercise caution – especially if this is something you are sensitive to. Thank you! Rennie75 thanks loads for keeping this story in order and fixing my typos etc when I get too carried away with the storyline to concentrate :)**

**Disclaimer: Think you all know it by now, but CW own Arrow, I own nothing.**

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><p><em>This gave Oliver an edge and one he was more than willing to use.<em>

**Oliver's POV**

"What do you think Tommy would say if he knew what you were planning?" Oliver said. Never mind that he already _knew_ what Tommy thought – Merlyn didn't and he was going to play on that. "Is this what you were busy learning when you abandoned him after his mother died?"

Oliver couldn't help but let out a loud moan of pain and Merlyn stabbed him deep in leg in instant response before twisting the arrow and yanking it back out. His reaction proved that Oliver's plan was working though, he was getting to Merlyn! The whole time he was getting to him that meant that Merlyn wasn't getting any useful information out of Oliver. Of course the problem with this strategy was that he was still getting weaker and more injuries meant it would be harder to escape. He knew that he would be limping now and wasn't sure just how far he was going to get on that leg. Merlyn had stabbed it what five, six times by this point.

Oliver knew that although the chains he was hanging from were strong, the pipes they were connected to were not. He was pretty certain he could break them if he exerted enough sudden force on the pipes, he just needed an opportunity to do it now. He had already mapped out the escape route from the warehouse long since. Now he just needed to bide his time and not get too wounded in the process to successfully make that escape.

"I may have known you since you were a child Oliver but you know _nothing_ about me! You have no right,_ no right_, to comment on anything I have done. You kill people too Oliver – what do you think Tommy would say if he knew _your_ precious secret?! Merlyn bit back plainly threatening Oliver, except of course the threat was useless – Tommy already knew exactly who he was, in fact he knew far more than Merlyn ever would!

Merlyn's cell rang then and Merlyn let out a bark of a laugh when he looked at the caller display. "It's Tommy, shall we tell him just who _you_ are then Oliver?!" But whatever it was that Tommy said to Merlyn it clearly distracted him so that whatever it was Merlyn had been about to say was quickly forgotten. Merlyn spared one last hatred-filled glare for Oliver before turning around and walking back up the stairs out of the warehouse basement.

The second that Merlyn had revealed it was Tommy calling Oliver had known that his Team and friend had orchestrated this in the hopes that it would give Oliver the opportunity he needed to escape. He just hoped that meant that they were also nearby.

Oliver took hold of the chains firmly in both hands before lifting his legs up to invert himself and climb the very chains he was hanging from. He was hurting so badly but had to clamp those feelings down and shut them away to be dealt with later. Preferably when he was back in the lair with Felicity 'getting to play doctor' as she'd put it so recently.

Felicity. He didn't think she realised just how much he relied on her. She was the light in his life, the one person who saw right through all the masks and the crap and saw _him_ – and yet despite that she didn't turn away. She didn't run from him, was never disgusted by him or his scars. He knew he'd let her down at times and that she'd been disappointed in him, yet she was still always there.

She was his focus and he used that right now in order to go beyond the pain. His muscles were burning and there was blood running down his chest, leg, and arms from the multiple injuries Merlyn had caused. Felicity, focus on Felicity. _She's waiting for you Oliver, think of her! H_e kept repeating that over and over like a mantra as he made it up to the top of the chain right by the pipes. He took a deep breath before letting go of the chain and allowing gravity to take over as he smashed back down to the ground. The pipes broke as he'd expected and he landed hard on his back.

The impact took his breath away but he knew he only had minutes at the very most before Merlyn or one of the guards he assumed there must be came to investigate. He got to his feet just as a guard came in and, despite the limp he'd expected to have, he was able to use the chains to fight off and choke the guard. He ran up the stairs as best he could and made his way out of the warehouse fighting off the other guards on the way.

Oliver took only seconds as he exited the warehouse to assess his surroundings. He knew he didn't have much time and was surprised that Merlyn hadn't come after him already, but running off without any idea of where he was going would have been more dangerous still. He was relieved to see the Diggle – and Tommy? - coming towards him from the car and limped towards them as fast as he could. His adrenaline was fast running out though and he'd barely made it to them before collapsing onto Tommy.

"Felicity..." was the last thing he managed to say before passing out completely.

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><p><strong>AN2: I really do appreciate all the follows, reviews, and faves so Thank You more than I can say to all you wonderful readers!<strong>


	14. Chapter 14

**AN: Memories/flashbacks are in italics. Hope you are enjoying it and I would love to know what you would like to see next :) Huge thanks as always to the continually wonderful Rennie75, thank you so much for putting up with me sweet! Big thanks also to all you lovely wonderful readers & reviewers, thank you!**

**Disclaimer: Really, do I still need to say it? I do not own Arrow, the CW does.**

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><p><em>"Felicity ..." was the last thing he managed to say before passing out completely.<em>

**Tommy's POV**

Tommy's face dropped in sheer horror at the sight of Oliver. He was covered in blood, his own from the look of it, and his body was a mess of purple bruises too. Oliver was staggering now and barely made it to him before collapsing into his arms. Thankfully Diggle helped to catch Oliver on the way down. Man, he was a _lot_ heavier now than he used to be when he'd dragged him home from parties passed out drunk! Oliver opened his mouth as he was going down and managed to whisper one word before he passed out altogether. Just one word, but _so_ much emotion in that word – Felicity.

Tommy just sighed quietly as he met Diggle's eyes and could see the same emotions were going through the older man's head too. Felicity and Oliver were utterly devoted to each other, yet both seemed completely unable (unwilling?) to do anything about it. Clearly Oliver still needed a wingman and Tommy promised himself that as soon as Oliver was back in the land of the living they would be having a talk about this! It seemed as if there were a great many conversations that were needed between the two of them now – at least this would be a happier subject matter than some of the others.

Diggle helped him get Oliver back into the car and they ran a lot of red lights on the way back to the lair. Diggle mumbled something under his breath about Detective Lance saying he could run all the reds he wanted and it was time to take him up on that. Tommy wasn't completely certain he'd heard him right, but it hardly mattered right now he supposed.

"How's he doing?" Diggle asked.

"I don't know, he's really pale and he's bleeding from ... everywhere." Tommy replied.

"What about his pulse, you need to check that and keep an eye on it." Diggle reminded him. He had made a point of getting some of those first aid lessons from Diggle since Oliver had been shot in the ankle, but he was a long way from remembering everything he needed to do without being prompted it appeared.

"It's weak, but fairly steady."

"Good, let's just hope it stays that way." Diggle hesitated there for a second before continuing. "Oliver has an annoying habit of crashing on us." It was clear that Diggle hadn't wanted to tell him that. Tommy remembered though how insistent Diggle had been that it was _vital_ to know as much information as possible when treating any injuries and assumed that telling him this formed part of that vital information.

Tommy blanched at that, feeling physically sick. His father had done this, caused all these injuries, and this time there was no room for any doubt at all. He thought back to what he'd seen, what they'd all seen of Oliver's capture and interrogation.

_. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ._

_When Diggle had told them that neither Oliver nor his father was there Felicity had quickly sprung into action and started doing something on her computers. Tommy had no idea what she was doing and although he was loathe to be in her way he _needed_ to know what she was doing, how they were going to find Oliver._

"_Felicity." It seemed this Team mind-reading thing they had going was now expanding to include him too and he hadn't need to say anything else before Felicity had cut in._

"_Wherever your father is is where Oliver is too and there's no way that Mr_**.**_ Merlyn would go anywhere without his cell he takes that everywhere so all I have to do is trace his signal and we can figure out where he is and use that location to figure out where Oliver is."_

_Tommy couldn't help but wonder if Felicity ever actually stopped to take a breath whilst talking – or thinking for that matter._

"_Yes, got it!" Felicity shouted triumphantly fist pumping the air at the same time._

"_You've found him?" Tommy queried, needing to confirm just what it was she'd found. He'd fast learnt that Felicity's genius level IQ meant that she was a master at multi-tasking so it was frequently hard to keep up let alone understand her – especially if you add in the rambling thing she was so adept at. This meant it was always wise to verify just exactly __what__ she was referring to by asking questions._

"_Yes no yes wait I've found Mr_**.**_ Merlyn's cell signal and I'm trying to triangulate backwards to find his location but he's bouncing the signal off multiple cell towers in an attempt to mask where he is. He thinks he's better but he not I'm better not that I mean he's not good because he is well he isn't but he's your father and I know that-"_

"_Felicity!" Tommy was really beginning to see why Diggle and Oliver had acquired the habit of saying her name loudly at the same time!_

"_Yes, right, sorry. Anyway I'm narrowing in on his location and should have it soon but I've found something else as well."_

"_What is it Felicity?" Diggle said from right behind him making Tommy jump slightly. Was he the only man around here who _didn't_ have ninja skills he couldn't but wonder?_

_Felicity had gone over some convoluted explanation that had soon left him behind. He had however managed to figure out that basically she had found video feed signals near his father's cell and had been checking them all in the hopes of finding something or other. Again he'd got lost as to just what it was she'd been looking for but she had ended up finding video of Oliver hanging suspended by chains in a damp warehouse – with his hood and top removed much to their dismay!_

_They had found themselves unwilling spectators as his father had interrogated and tortured Oliver. He had been obsessed on finding out who Oliver was working with. He knew that there had to be somebody who was running the tech stuff and he had been right. But, what his father clearly didn't know was just how devoted Oliver was to Felicity, mind you Tommy wasn't so sure that Oliver realised that either. Getting between Oliver and Felicity was just not wise though and Tommy could see that Oliver was drawing strength from focusing on his IT girl, despite the worsening injuries that his father was inflicting._

_Tommy was horrified to see just what his father was doing. How could he _do_ that?! He had never in his worst nightmares believed that his father was capable of doing this – and the fact that he was doing it to Tommy's _best friend_ only made it worse. Oliver and Tommy had spent most of their childhoods together, both families had been very close, so how could his father do this to a man he had watched grow up from a young child. He was struggling to stop himself from throwing up at the horror of what he was watching._

_Things came to a head though when Tommy heard his father threatening Oliver with revealing his secret to Tommy! He was _not_ about to let his father drag him into this to!_

"_Felicity, we have to do _something_, now!" He said in desperation._

"_Okay I've got it, I know where he is! Mr Merlyn may have masked his cell's location but he didn't mask the video feed so well. They're in an abandoned warehouse deep in the Glades."_

"_Call him, say whatever you want but you need to distract him." Diggle instructed._

_Tommy felt sick at the mere thought of talking to his father, but if this was what was needed to help his friend then he was damned if he was going to let him down!_

_. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ._

Thinking back now Tommy couldn't even remember what it was he'd said, just that Diggle had been signalling that he needed to get his father to leave the basement to give Oliver a real chance for escape. He'd made the call from the car with Felicity listening in over the comms whilst he and Diggle had driven as fast as they could to where Felicity said Oliver was being held. He'd had to concentrate so hard on that call to make sure he didn't mess up and make things worse for Oliver.

They'd made it back to the lair and he helped Diggle get Oliver inside and onto the medical table. Felicity had already got all the supplies out and ready for them whilst they'd been gone. Felicity turned and saw Oliver and gasped, this time it was her turn to say just one word softly. "Oliver".


	15. Chapter 15

**AN: Thank you all so much for your support and incredibly kind comments, I am so grateful to you all! Rennie75 thank you for beta-ing this so fast for me and putting up with all the extra errors this time. (That's what happens when I am forced to write on paper instead of computer & then transcribe, sorry!) You are a true star Rennie :D - all mistakes are of course mine though!**

**Disclaimer: Doh, Arrow still isn't mine :( Just playing in the CW's sandpit.**

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><p><em>Felicity turned and saw Oliver and gasped, this time it was her turn to just say one word softly. "Oliver".<em>

**Tommy's POV**

Tommy couldn't help but be struck by the look in Felicity's eyes when she saw Oliver. The fact that she only said one word, his name, just as he had only said her name didn't escape his notice either. He glanced briefly at Diggle and saw that he had noticed it too. It was definitely going to be time for a little wingman chat when Oliver was okay again – and he had to be okay! Tommy had lost Oliver was once, for five years, there was _no way _he was he was going to lose him again – especially not with his father being the cause.

Diggle wasted no time issuing instructions to Felicity and Tommy and what felt like the next age passed in cleaning and patching up Oliver and simply keeping their friend alive. Tommy was utterly horrified at the scale of damage that his father had inflicted. As they cleaned away the blood yet more bruising was revealed. Diggle said that it looked like Oliver had multiple broken ribs and needed so many stitches for all the knife and arrow wounds that Tommy soon lost count.

"There's no fever, looks like the knife was clean at least." Diggle said – yet even though his words were clearly a good sign, his voice sounded far from re-assuring.

"So what else is wrong?" Tommy asked, Diggle's voice had made it perfectly clear that _something_ definitely was.

"He's lost a _lot_ of blood."

"We've got spare blood though." Felicity cut in insistently indicating the bag of blood that was already hung and running through the IV.

"Let's just hope it will be enough, he's lost a lot Felicity and he's pretty dehydrated too."

Nothing more was said for a while as they focused on their work. Eventually they had done all they could and the rest was down to Oliver. Tommy caught the bottle of water that Diggle threw at him before he crashed down onto the nearest chair, truly shattered. How Diggle and Felicity dealt with this on a fairly regular basis he did not know! Out of the corner of his eye he saw Felicity pulling over the defibrillator cart and quirked an eyebrow at her questioningly.

"Just taking a precaution – Oliver, he has this habit … just when you think he's okay he crashes on you. This time I'm going to be ready if he does it again!"

Tommy honestly didn't know what to say to that. He'd known of course that Diggle wasn't joking when he'd said about Oliver's habit of crashing on them – but still it had hit him much harder to _actually see_ Felicity bring the cart over. There was just something so awfully _real_ about actually _seeing_ the thing! He just nodded slowly, not having the words to respond.

"Now what?" Tommy finally asked after taking a long drink from the bottle of water.

"Now we wait – and just hope that he's finally decided to break that habit because as habits go that one's really annoying not that I mean that it's annoying to have to use the defibrillator because I don't mind using it well I do because it's not a nice thing to have to do but that's not what I mean I just mean that I wish he would stop making it necessary to keep using it because ..."

"We know what you mean Felicity." Diggle finally cut in.

Tommy noted that the older man had let her babbling go on much longer than he or Oliver normally did, but he didn't object as it seemed that it actually helped her to let off steam to go on like that. Goodness knows they were all entitled to a little stress relief after the last few days. He stifled a yawn as he realised that it was actually a different day now than when this _mission _had all started. They had gone to plant that virus at Merlyn Global yesterday morning, now it was the following afternoon and none of them had had any rest ever since it began.

_Was it really only yesterday?_ It certainly felt like a lot longer than that now to be honest! Mind you, when he thought about everything that had happened since then it was hardly surprising that it seemed longer. This was probably the longest 36 hours he had _ever_ lived through – and the hardest – and that included when he father had been shot with that poisoned bullet.

_His father. _He was the whole reason that they were in this situation right now. Sitting here, waiting, watching, hoping. Hoping that Oliver would be okay. Hoping that he would make it through without any permanent damage. Hoping that this time Oliver wouldn't crash on them. Hoping. Hoping. Hoping.

Tommy looked over at Oliver lying there so still on the table and his eyes were drawn to the restraints strapping Oliver down to the table. He vaguely remembered querying about them initially when Felicity and Diggle had strapped Oliver down and he'd been told they would 'explain later'. _Well now was later wasn't it?! _It wasn't that he didn't trust the pair because he did, after all they'd just saved Oliver's life (again), but still, restraints?

Diggle caught the look and answered before Tommy had a chance to even form the question. "You know how disoriented you can be when you first wake up sometimes? Well think about waking up somewhere different to where you fell asleep – you've probably done that a few times right?" Diggle asked pointedly, but not unkindly.

Tommy couldn't argue with that, he certainly had passed out drunk more than a few times and woken up somewhere completely different with no memory of how he'd got there. But he still didn't see how that all added up to restraints being needed.

"Think about that, the disorientation and confusion. Then add in the pain that Oliver must be in right now and the memories he has of what's just happened."

"Being tortured, by my father." Tommy supplied bitterly, saving Diggle from having to say the words.

"Yeah. Well add that to the fact that for five years Oliver survived purely by his instincts, by fighting almost everyone around him just to make it through each day. Those five years created some very hard won survival instincts and that means when he first comes round he can be _very_ dangerous to those in the immediate vicinity." Diggle rubbed his throat ruefully and Tommy realised that he must be talking from experience.

"The restraints were Oliver's idea Tommy and he installed them and ordered us to ensure we used them." Felicity added. "The last thing Oliver wants is to hurt someone he cares about." She finished sadly and Tommy knew how true that was. His friend seemed to carry so much guilt on his shoulders already, the last thing he needed was more. Tommy nodded acknowledging this, and also his understanding and agreement to the use of the restraints. He turned away completely drained and had another long drink.

**Some time passed quietly with nothing more to do now than wait and watch and hope. Diggle changed the saline and blood IVs a few times. No matter how many times Felicity sat down at her computers she still ended up drifting back over to be by Oliver's side, before heading back to her computers yet again whenever she noticed that he or Diggle were watching. Tommy couldn't help but be amused by this, despite the severity of the situation.**

A sudden movement and thrashing sound made him jump and just as suddenly Diggle jumped into action at Oliver's side. Felicity was only mere seconds behind but Tommy noticed that she didn't get as close to Oliver as Diggle. He followed them to Oliver's side, but at Felicity's look he was careful to stand a short distance away too, leaving Diggle as the only one who was actually right next to Oliver. Oliver was desperately fighting to break free.

"Oliver, Oliver, it's Diggle man. Oliver, you're at your club, you're at Verdant. This isn't Lian Yu, Oliver you're home!" Diggle was speaking clearly and calmly. At the same time he was holding Oliver firmly by the shoulders and being careful not to hurt him, but clearly trying to anchor him back into the current day.

Tommy could see that Oliver's eyes were glazed and darting wildly from side to side, taking a few minutes to refocus on Diggle. Oliver's breathing slowed and he stopped straining against the restraints, as he took in Diggle's words and registered where he was.

"Home?" Oliver queried in a rasping voice.

"Yeah man, you're home, you're okay." Diggle confirmed.

Tommy thought that 'okay' was stretching the point somewhat, but figured it wasn't all that important right now. His friend was alive, safe, and back with them – and much to Tommy's relief Oliver _hadn't_ crashed on them this time! He guessed all the rest could wait for now. _Oliver was going to okay!_ Nothing else mattered he realised.

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><p><strong>AN: Thank you to all my wonderful readers for sticking with me - you are fabulous! Please let me know what you think, and if there's anything you'd like to see happen do tell - I can't promise I'll include it, but I do promise to think about and do it if I can make it work :D<strong>


	16. Chapter 16

**AN: Apologies for the delay in updating this. Thank you all for sticking with me despite the delays. Life has badly got in the way these past couple of weeks and this week in particular has been bad for me as I had a miscarriage. I trust you guys will understand why fanfic was of course the last thing on my mind. Bigger thanks than ever go to my wonderful beta & friend Rennie75, thank you Rennie for supporting me through this, will never forget that my friend! All mistakes are mine still however.**

**Disclaimer: Ho hum, Arrow still belongs to CW, but a girl can dream right?**

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><p><em>"Home?" Oliver queried in a rasping voice.<em>

_"Yeah man, you're home, you're okay." Diggle confirmed._

_Tommy thought that 'okay' was stretching the point somewhat, but figured it wasn't all that important right now. His friend was alive, safe, and back with them – and much to Tommy's relief Oliver hadn't crashed on them this time! He guessed all the rest could wait for now. Oliver was going to okay! Nothing else mattered he realised._

**Tommy's POV**

Tommy's relief had fast been joined by stunned shock when Oliver had insisted on sitting up mere seconds after Diggle had removed the restraints. He knew that Oliver was used to pain and injury, but still, minutes ago he had been worried whether Oliver was even going to make it and yet here he was sitting up and talking like hardly anything had happened. Admittedly he was moving more carefully and slightly more slowly than usual, but still!

Clearly his look hadn't escaped Diggle's attention as Diggle had been quick to reassure him. _Did anything escape that man's attention?_

"It's okay man, despite appearances Oliver does know his limits." Diggle said calmly. Tommy remained unconvinced however.

"Tommy, you don't have to look so worried, I'm alright. It's not as bad as it looks." Oliver said, but his raspy voice didn't help to convince Tommy.

"Alright? How can you say you're alright?! Oliver we've just spent goodness knows how long stitching you back together!"

Tommy couldn't help but be annoyed with how blasé Oliver was being. Was he really that careless about his own physical state and safety? Tommy couldn't make that add up with how much care Oliver took over his training and what he ate though.

"Trust me, I've been through way worse on the Island and I didn't have friends to patch me back up there. I'm okay Tommy, you don't have to worry." Tommy just threw up his hands and sighed in despair at his friend. He realised though that he wasn't being blasé, somehow Oliver genuinely did think that his current condition was 'alright'!

The realisation that Oliver had been through so much that he honestly did consider his current horrific state as 'okay' made Tommy feel so sad for his friend and everything he had suffered. He knew there was nothing to be gained by arguing further however, so he just passed Oliver a fresh bottle of water which he accepted gratefully.

"So, how are we going to explain this one?" Oliver asked seemingly to the Team in general, although Tommy noted that his focus was mainly on Felicity as he spoke.

"Don't look at me man." Diggle stated bluntly to Oliver when it became clear that nobody had any answers. "I ran out of explanations back at Christmas. Besides as Felicity is so keen on pointing out, I'm no better at cover stories than you are!"

"Whoa, hey, I know I said I'd help cover but this was _not_ what I had in mind I'd be covering for." Tommy said when they had all looked at him after Diggle's comment.

"Sigh, I suppose yet again it will be down to me to come up with a cover story for you Oliver."

Tommy was somewhat concerned at that – much as he'd never risk her ire by saying it, Felicity's cover stories really weren't much better than either Oliver's or Diggle's, which is why they'd dragged him into that job to start with. Still, he maintained that covering for these kinds of injuries was definitely _not_ what he'd had in mind when he'd agreed. However, as his father was the cause he supposed he'd better come up with something – and explain why they'd disappeared overnight at the same time.

"ATV." Tommy expanded when they looked at him blankly. "You used to say that you'd take me out on ATVs one day. We decided that yesterday would be as good a time as any, only you came off your bike and got a bit bashed up so we decided to stay in a hotel overnight. Explains some injuries and limping as well as us both disappearing overnight."

Diggle nodded approving, apparently today he was gaining some bonus points with the older man which pleased Tommy more than he'd expected.

"Felicity, can you arrange for the receipts and everything and find a place that we could have gone please." Oliver said signalling his agreement to the story. Again Tommy couldn't help but notice how Oliver always looked to Felicity for support even when it wasn't always necessary – after all, who was going to bother to ask them for the receipts or whatever?! A chat with Oliver was definitely on the cards once he was okay again, or at least closer to Tommy's definition of okay.

Although Tommy couldn't but help thinking that it might actually be easier to have that kind of conversation whilst Oliver was somewhat less mobile still, less able to make a quick getaway – or lash out for that matter. Tommy knew that, whilst Oliver would never plan to hurt him intentionally, saying anything about Felicity that Oliver didn't like was always potentially risky.

_. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ._ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .__ . . . . . . . . . . __

Later on once Oliver had rested a bit more, but still way before Tommy thought he could possibly be ready, he had got dressed (refusing help) and insisted on returning to the Mansion. Oliver had checked his phone only to find numerous increasingly sarcastic and annoyed messages from Thea asking where the hell he was and if he was planning on coming home any time soon. Tommy had insisted on going with him saying that if Oliver had really been injured quad-biking then it would only be normal for Tommy to take him back home and pointed out that queries would be raised if he didn't. Reluctantly Oliver had agreed.

Tommy was horrified when Thea ran up to Oliver giving him a big tight hug before thumping him soundly on the chest. He couldn't believe that Oliver barely even winced! _Just how much pain could his friend take? _He could see Diggle mouthing _"Poker face"_ to him silently though and took a quick deep breath before cutting in.

"Easy Speedy, your brother decided it was about time he was the speedy one – right before getting thrown off his ATV." He had tried for a light-hearted tone, but from the look on Diggle's face it still needed some work.

"ATV? Since when do you have an ATV!" Thea said sounding somewhat incensed.

"I don't, but Tommy and I had planned on trying them right before I went away and never got round to it and now seemed like a good time to rectify that." Oliver paused briefly before adding in a somewhat rueful tone "It was harder than it looked." Apparently Oliver was good at lying to his family at least – provided he didn't have to come up with the cover stories in the first place.

"So that meant you didn't have access to a phone?!" Thea replied sarcastically. It seemed that she was _not_ going to be pacified easily this time.

"Give you brother a break, he got pretty beat up when he came off so we decided to crash overnight in Central City before heading back." Okay maybe it _had_ been a good idea for Felicity to find out where the local ATV locations were after all.

Tommy could see that Oliver was running out of adrenaline and was close to crashing, as well as noticing that Diggle's eye seemed drawn to a spot on Oliver's chest. Following Diggle's look he could see that Oliver's shirt was getting darker where Thea had hit him. Clearly he was bleeding through the dressings and time was running out before Thea spotted it too. He put Oliver's arm around his shoulders before turning and heading for the stairs.

"Okay enough interrogations Speedy, your brother needs to rest." He said in a blunt but friendly tone aiming for the tone that Diggle always seemed to manage that nobody argued with. Clearly, it still needed work though as Thea opened her mouth to argue.

"Speedy, we'll talk later okay, I'm going to rest." Oliver put in before Thea could speak. Leaning on Tommy visibly for Thea's benefit Oliver continued towards the stairs. Tommy could tell from the weight on his shoulders that, even if Oliver was only intending to do it for Thea's benefit, his friend clearly needed that support too and he helped him upstairs and into Oliver's room as fast as they could without raising additional questions.

Diggle met them there about 10 minutes later with the first aid kit. "Sorry, I had to wait for Thea to go before I could get the kit in here." He said explaining the short delay as Oliver peeled off his shirt to reveal that the blood had soaked right through the dressing on his chest. He could also see that several other dressings on Oliver's side was going the same way where Thea had hugged him.

Tommy was sickened by the bruises that were fast turning purple all over every inch of Oliver's visible skin. He was still struggling hugely with the fact that _his father_ had caused these injuries, this bruising. Despite having actually witnessed a fair bit of it over that security feed he couldn't reconcile _that man_ with the father that he knew and had grown up with. He suspected this wasn't going to be an easy paradigm shift (as Felicity had put it) for him to adjust to.

Felicity, everything kept coming back to Felicity, and Tommy decided that whether Oliver liked it or not, it was about time they had that little chat and he gave Oliver some answers of his own!

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><p><strong>AN2: Hope you all enjoyed it, please let me know your thoughts. Shameless plug for favs, follows, and reviews lol :)<strong>


	17. Chapter 17

**AN: Fair warning, this chapter mentions the after-effects of torture and contains discussion of this. I am no expert whatsoever so if I get any of this stuff wrong please forgive me. If you may be sensitive to this material please exercise caution!**

**Thank you all so much for sticking with me & for all your lovely reviews; for following & faving, means a lot to me! As always, Rennie75 is the amazing beta who keeps me on track & makes this read properly. All mistakes are mine though – whatever I've missed is down to me not Rennie :D**

**Disclaimer: No change, Arrow is still owned by CW, but a girl can dream right?  
><strong>

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><p><em>Felicity, everything kept coming back to Felicity, and Tommy decided that whether Oliver liked it or not, it was about time they had that little chat and he gave Oliver some answers of his own!<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

Diggle had made quick work of changing Oliver's soaked dressings and re-stitching where the wounds had come open again; whilst Tommy had stood guard near the door to make sure that Thea didn't change her mind and decide to come back and continue her interrogations of Oliver. Oliver had winced visibly and let out a low hiss of pain only once while Diggle had stitched what was obviously a very sore cut on his chest. Tommy knew that his father had taken pains to cut over Oliver's existing scars and was worried at just how badly Oliver had been hurt if he was making a sound now instead of maintaining his normally impassive face – something Tommy had learnt was pretty rare for Oliver to do. For that matter it was rare for Oliver to allow someone to do the stitches for him when he was conscious.

Tommy was worried about just how much impact all this was going to have on his friend and not just physically. No matter what Oliver seemed to think, he was still human and the torture he had just been through had to have brought back some pretty painful memories; meaning that this was going to affect him mentally and emotionally too. Tommy decided that no matter what Oliver wanted or thought, he _would _be staying close by for the next few days at least.

Diggle left as soon as he was finished, saying that he would get Raisa to bring up some food so they wouldn't have to go down for dinner. Tommy was grateful to him for thinking of that and stating it in that tone of his that brooked no arguments – even from Oliver. _Really must learn how to do that tone!_

"So how are you really?"

"I'm fine Tommy." Oliver said quietly. Tommy was less than convinced however.

"Oliver, it's me okay. Not Diggle, not Felicity, me. You don't have to play the tough guy around me, there's no Felicity here to impress, so I'm going to ask you again – how are you, really?"

"I'm not acting Tommy, it's okay, I really am fine, truly." Oliver insisted with a half-smile.

Tommy was more convinced this time, but still decided to reserve full judgment until he had seen how Oliver was over the next few days. He knew from conversations with the other Team Membersthat Oliver still had problems sleeping and he was worried how this was going to affect that.

Much to his relief the rest of the evening went quietly enough and Oliver seemed to be moving a little better; and soon enough he could see Oliver thinking about telling him to go home. However Tommy knew that his friend suffered from some pretty bad nightmares, even though he had yet to see one. He knew that the events of the past couple of days were pretty likely to have triggered more – heck he would probably even have some himself, so there was no way he was leaving Oliver alone tonight. This meant that Tommy was determined to get in first before Oliver could say anything about going home.

"Blankets still in the closet? What, you've gotta be kidding if you think I'm sleeping on the couch without any blankets!" Tommy quickly added at Oliver's bemused look.

"Tommy, you don't have to stay, I really am okay."

Tommy had been ready for that however and had his response already prepared. "Oliver, I just spent the last two days patching you up after watching you being tortured by my father, so if you think I'm going to go back to his house you've got another thing coming! And before you say it I'm not staying at Laurel's either. She'd know something was up straight away and you _know_ she never lets anything drop!"

Oliver grimaced at that and Tommy knew he'd won. Using what his father had done might have been hitting below the belt, but if that's what it took to make sure his friend was looked after then he was prepared to do it. Oliver's well-being was paramount – after everything _that man_ had done watching over Oliver was the least he owed him he figured.

"Okay, but don't moan at me if you wake up with a bad back after sleeping on that thing!" Oliver came back at Tommy, but it was a poor attempt at their normal light-hearted banter if you asked him. Still, it was reassuring that Oliver was at least trying it so Tommy decided to let it slide - for now anyway.

They soon both settled down for the night with Tommy borrowing a spare pair of sweatpants from Oliver's wardrobe without bothering to ask. After all, it was hardly the first time that he had stayed over at the Queen Mansion unplanned. Tommy thought back to a conversation he'd had with Diggle what felt like a long time ago when Diggle had said that whilst Oliver might be physically back from the Island, he was still trapped on Lian Yu in many ways and had yet to come fully back to them.

Tommy knew that if he was going to help his friend fully return then it was important to act as normally around him as he could – so no tiptoeing around him then. After all, neither Felicity not Diggle trod carefully around Oliver and he seemed to spend as much time with them as he possible. The only time he was really himself was around them, so if that's how Oliver wanted to be treated Tommy figured he'd do the same.

Tommy was woken suddenly only a few hours later by the sound of Oliver shouting and thrashing about wildly. He ran straight to Oliver's side before hesitating slightly remembering Diggle's warning about getting too close. It took him less than half a second to decide that Oliver needed him now as wherever his friend was in this nightmare it clearly was _not_ a good place!

Oliver was hard to understand, but from the few words Tommy could make out it seemed he was being interrogated and was trying to convince his interrogators that he didn't know someone. He'd thought it was nearly over when Oliver had gone quiet momentarily, so was badly shaken just seconds later when Oliver started screaming in agony and bucking against the bed.

"Don't … know ...Yao Fei!" Oliver ground out between screams.

_Yao Fei, wait wasn't that the name of the guy who'd helped Oliver when he'd first got to the Island?_ Tommy remembered Oliver telling him about, the one that English guy had wanted him to give up. _Oh shit! Oliver said the man had tortured him using a sword making the very scars that his father had just re-cut_. Clearly Oliver was right back there in his nightmare.

Tommy lost no time in shaking Oliver firmly by the shoulders, trying to repeat Diggle's words from earlier "Oliver, you're safe man, you're home. Oliver, it's me, Tommy, you're home. This isn't Lian Yu, you're at the Mansion, you're safe, you're safe!"

Clearly this was yet another thing he needed to work on Tommy thought as he found himself flying through the air and crashing down onto his back after being thrown by Oliver. Before he could even catch his breath though Oliver's hand had sliced down on his throat and was choking him.

"Ol..iv..er!" He barely managed to get out the name as it felt like his windpipe was being crushed – for that matter it probably _was _being crushed.

"Tommy?! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!" Oliver backed away as fast as he could 'til his back was against the wall with a look of abject horror and shame on his face.

Belatedly Tommy remembered that Oliver had been restrained when Diggle had brought him back to the current day back at Verdant. _Okay, maybe those restraints really were necessary_. He sat up massaging his throat, now he knew why Diggle had rubbed his throat when talking about Oliver coming back round.

"It's okay, I'm fine Oliver. I'm fine." Tommy added more forcefully as Oliver was clearly unconvinced. He was still breathing really fast and Tommy could see the struggle he was having to get himself back under control.

"Oliver, it's okay, really, don't worry about it. No blood, no foul." Tommy hoped that using the same phrase they'd always used as kids would help to reassure Oliver, but it didn't seem to help this time.

Tommy could see it was going to take some convincing to get through to Oliver this time though. Looks like Felicity was right about the last thing Oliver needed was to have hurt someone he cared about – but then Felicity always was right when it came to Oliver it seemed, and most other things too for that matter. But as everything kept coming back to Felicity where Oliver was concerned then maybe she would be the way to get through to him too.

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><p><strong>AN2: I know, I know, many of you were waiting for that 'wingman chat' I promise you it <strong>_**is**_** coming though – in the very next chapter, promise! It's actually almost finished so will be up in the next day or too. Hope you all enjoyed it, I love reading your comments so please don't forget to let me know what you think, thank you! :-D**


	18. Chapter 18

**AN: Firstly I wanna say a big thank you to all you amazing people who took the time to read, fav, follow, and/or review - you are amazing and I am SO grateful! OK, here it is at last, the long promised 'wingman chat'! Enjoy – you have **_**no**_** idea how hard this was for me to write so I am actually pretty nervous about posting it, gulp! Huge thanks to Rennie75 for keeping me going with a very difficult chapter to write, really really hope you all like it! All mistakes are still mine though :)**

**Disclaimer: Still owned by CW, not me.**

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><p><em>Tommy could see it was going to take some convincing to get through to Oliver this time though. Looks like Felicity was right about the last thing Oliver needed was to have hurt someone he cared about – but then Felicity always was right when it came to Oliver it seemed, and most other things too for that matter. But as everything kept coming back to Felicity where Oliver was concerned then maybe she would be the way to get through to him too.<em>

**Tommy's POV**

Tommy waited for Oliver to get his breathing back under control and then passed him a glass of water before sitting back on the couch. Oliver went to the bathroom and came back with a towel round his neck and it was clear from the water rivulets on his face that Oliver had had to splash water on his face to calm back down this time. Tommy could see his friend needed time to get his emotions back under control and so he gave him that time without feeling the need to comment on it. He just hoped that sooner or later Oliver wouldn't feel the need to hide those emotions around him all the time.

"I think it's time we talk Oliver..." Tommy started to say before Oliver cut in.

"Tommy I'm sorry man, it won't happen again..." But this time it was Tommy's turn to cut in.

"Hey, that's not what I meant Oliver. I'm fine okay, you don't need to worry about me!" Tommy wished he'd realised how Oliver would take his words _before_ he'd said them. He took a deep breath trying to think through his next words more carefully. Oliver was clearly hurting badly and he needed to find a way to help his friend.

"What happened to you, the stuff you've been through in the last six years, it's more than any one person should have to go through in an entire lifetime. You said that on the Island you didn't have anyone to patch you up, but you need to realise that that's not true now, you're not alone anymore Oliver."

"I know that Tommy." Oliver didn't seem too impressed with the direction this was heading and seemed to want to end the conversation. But now that Tommy had started it he had no intention of letting Oliver get away.

"Do you? I mean do you really know that? We're not just here to patch up your injuries and cover for you or whatever. You have friends Oliver, real friends that you can count on – and rely on to be there for you, no matter what." Tommy paused for a moment, covering a small sigh as he could see that Oliver wasn't really taking in what he was saying. _How can I convince him of the truth of this?_

"Oliver, you care about us right, about the things we go through?

"Yeah of course, you know that Tommy" Oliver replied sounding bemused.

"Felicity mentioned that you once told that if she needed anyone to talk to about her day she could always talk to you." Tommy figured that if Oliver cared about Felicity as much as he thought she did, then talking about her might be the way to get through to his friend, it had to be worth a try at least – and right now he didn't have any better ideas. _Some wingman I am!_

"Yeah I did, and that goes for you too Tommy. You know you can always talk to me - this stuff I know it gets a little intense and it's not as if you can go and talk to your family either, heck none of us can. I know I'm not good at the whole talking emotions thing..."

_Me either!_ Tommy thought.

"...but that doesn't mean I can't listen if you need to talk ever."

"But that's what I mean Oliver, you are always ready to listen to _us,_ to help _us_. You do whatever is needed for Starling City without any thought of what that could mean for you, whether you could be hurt or anything."

"It's not like I go out aiming to hurt."

"I know, but you don't hold back either. If something needs to be done to help and there's a risk to you that never stops you from doing it anyway.

"Why would I..."

"Just let me finish Oliver, it's not as if I'm exactly good at this talking emotions thing either." Tommy interjected ruefully. He took a deep breath before continuing.

"Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that you need to realise that you're not still on that Island. If you get hurt, when you get hurt, we hurt too. Think about how you'd feel if Felicity was hurt, or even Diggle or I were; there's nothing you wouldn't do to help, to rescue her if she was taken. Well that's how we feel about you too. Every time you get hurt, every wound you take. Oliver I'm going to say this until it sinks into that thick skull of yours –_we care about you!_"

Oliver stayed quiet this time whilst Tommy was talking and he hoped that meant his friend was actually listening to him properly.

_All or nothing._ Tommy figured taking another breath. "You are stuck in the past, focusing on what's been and done. You can't change what's already happened Oliver – you know that. Time to start looking forward to the future; and whether you accept it or not you _do _have a future – and someone to share it with and not just in a platonic way either unless I'm seriously mistaken!" Tommy finished with a grin, before looking at Oliver's face which was still utterly blank. _Yup, completely dense when it comes to Felicity._

"You have all these super ninja skills yet you seem to have completely missed the fact that a certain blonde cares about you in more than a friendly way." Tommy said with a sigh.

"No..." Oliver started to reply but Tommy cut in instantly, he wasn't going to have Oliver get away this lightly. _Whether Oliver wanted a wingman or not he is gonna get one!_

"Oliver, are you _seriously _saying you haven't noticed the way she watches you when you're training. Man, the girl practically drools over you every time you take your shirt off – and you tend to be shirtless a _lot _around her!"

"You're wrong Tommy, we're just friends. Felicity doesn't care about me in that way." Oliver insisted.

"Yeah right"! He replied lacing the two words with as much sarcasm as he could possibly manage.

"How could she – I'm damaged?! I can't even sleep a whole night without waking up covered in sweat from the nightmares. She knows more than most about what I've been through. Felicity has to see that every time she looks at me. That's all she sees when she look at me while I'm training – the scars."

"Oliver!" Tommy could not believe just how dense his friend was being! "I know the Island changed you, but you used to be good with women, at reading them. Are you really saying that you can't see that _Felicity loves you?!_ She is devoted to you, you should have seen the way she was when you were captured and we were trying to find you. Oliver she didn't even stop for a coffee man – and you know what she's like about her caffeine fixes! Yeah we got coffee for her, but still … Felicity without a coffee break?!"

Oliver stayed silent so Tommy took a deep breath before finishing with the one thing he'd wanted to say from the start of this wingman chat.

"You do have a future – and it's with Felicity!"

**Oliver's POV**

Oliver couldn't believe what Tommy was saying, and yet he could see the truth of his friend's words and it was clear that he believed everything he said. Oliver could see his pulse and the only increase was when Tommy'd got annoyed with his refusal to believe what he was saying. If he'd been lying it would have shown. But just because Tommy believed it was true didn't mean that it actually was true.

Tommy _was _right about the caffeine though! Nothing got in the way of Felicity's coffee so if she didn't even stop for a refill and only drank what Tommy and Digg had got for it that had to mean something, surely? _So that meant … but no, it couldn't be true … Felicity couldn't love me, not in that way. She couldn't, could she?_

For the first time since this whole thing had started, back when Oliver had revealed his identity, Oliver felt like for once Tommy was the one with all the answers and he was the one with all the questions...

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><p><strong>AN2: Hope you all enjoyed it, I love reading your comments so please don't forget to let me know what you think, thank you! I have decided that I am unlikely to end this story any time soon, so if there's anything you'd like to see please let me know :-D<strong>

**AN3: Final note, I am now writing another story too on here called Lance's Questions which the first chapter is about to be posted for. I'd love to hear what you think of that too so consider this my shameless plug tehehe :-)**


	19. Chapter 19

**AN: Firstly, I would like to say a big thank you to all those who regularly review my stories, it really means a lot to me so Thank You! Thank you also to those of you who've taken the time to go and check out my other unrelated Arrow fic 'Lance's Questions'. Secondly, I have had so much support from you all & so many lovely comments and sympathies from you all re my miscarriage last week & I want you to know how much that touched and helped me. You are wonderful kind people whose support I will never forget! May God bless you all!**

**AN2: Rennie75 is the fabulous beta who makes all this possible - and makes it make sense lol! Three cheers for Rennie :D**

**Disclaimer: Arrow owns CW, I don't own any of it at all.**

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><p><em>For the first time since this whole thing had started, back when Oliver had revealed his identity, Oliver felt like for once Tommy was the one with all the answers and he was the one with all the questions...<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

The next week or so had passed somewhat more quietly and for that Tommy was grateful. Oliver clearly needed more time to recover than he was willing to admit, going on the increase in his nightmares at least. Tommy had more or less moved into the Mansion on a temporary basis until he found a place of his own. It had taken some convincing on his part to get Oliver to agree; but both Diggle and Felicity had backed him up on how unwise it was for him to more in with Laurel, especially with all the comings and goings lately. She would never have just accepted that it was all to do with Verdant and they couldn't afford the distraction of her nosing about in everything right now.

At least Oliver had understood Tommy's complete refusal to go back to _that man's place_ as he now referred to his father's house. There was simply no way that Tommy could face meeting up with his father. He knew his acting wouldn't be up to it and as far as _that man_ was aware Tommy didn't know who the Arrow was. He'd barely managed to get through the couple of phone calls needed to convince him that everything was fine, and that he just wanted to be more independent now that he had a job of his own and everything.

Thea had inadvertently helped out too by moaning loudly about the state Oliver was in after his 'ATV accident' whilst he'd been on the phone to _that man. _Tommy's cover for not staying at home currently being that he felt guilty for suggesting to Oliver that they should try out ATV's. Admittedly they'd had to alter the cover story somewhat for his benefit as obviously he knew exactly _how_ Oliver had been hurt – and that Tommy had been nowhere near at the time. Tommy remembered the panic he'd felt when Thea had made that comment though, he'd been so sure she was going to mention him going with Oliver and that would have dropped them all right in it.

Laurel wasn't the only one who was querying all the goings on either. Thea was getting more and more suspicious too, sooner or later Oliver was going to _have_ to tell her what was going on despite his desire to keep her and everyone else they cared about completely out of it. Tommy understood that and even agreed with it – but Thea was more intelligent than people than people gave her credit for and there was just no way she was going to keep buying all the cover stories they were coming up with**.**

A few days after Oliver's escape cum rescue they'd had a Team Meeting at the lair. Oliver had insisted he was fine despite Tommy's objections and pointed out that he needed to go out and about as close to normal as he could otherwise Thea would get even more suspicious. _Way to use my own arguments against me!_

They knew they were running out of time before the Undertaking happened, but had no new info on the whereabouts of the earthquake machine. Tommy still struggled to get his head around the fact that such a thing existed, but since seeing what _that man_ had done to Oliver he could no longer, would no longer, deny his father's part in the whole thing. It was clear that the father he had grown up with had little to do with the man that he was now, and that he would stop at nothing to achieve his aims, no matter how twisted they were.

"So just what are we going to do to stop the Undertaking?" Tommy asked in despair after they'd gone round and round in circles a few times trying to come up with a way of tracking the machine down.

"Felicity have your searches come up with anything?" Oliver asked by way of an answer.

"No and it's driving me nuts. I keep thinking about why that is and Merlyn not you Merlyn I mean your father Merlyn is really good well obviously he's not good he's bad but he's like _really_ _good_ at covering his tracks-"

"Felicity!" Oliver and Diggle said concurrently and Tommy smothered a smile at how natural this all seemed to him now. It appeared that he was nearly as used to Felicity's babbling now as they were.

"-anyway I thought back to how I traced the wreckage of the boat and I don't know why but I keep coming back to the list you got from your father Oliver because if you think about it everything keeps coming back to that and I know that it ties in somehow but I can't quite put my finger on it."

"What do the names have in common?" Tommy asked.

"That's a good point actually Tommy. Felicity, have you run any of the names on the list together?" Diggle asked.

"Oliver do you have any idea just _how_ many people are on that list?" Felicity said in exasperated indignation. "I love that you think that much of my skills but even I can't run all those names together – not without hacking into some serious government level software and taking it over completely and there's no way to do it for that length of time without them noticing."

"Okay so you run a few of them at a time." Tommy said trying to pacify her.

"Yeah but where do we start?" Felicity queried slightly calmer but still somewhat annoyed.

"With the ones that are dead." Tommy went on to explain when they looked at him blankly. "Felicity you said you couldn't find his tracks right, well the dead aren't going to be scheming any more so what better way to cover them than by using the names of dead men?"

"You might be on to something there Tommy, why don't you help Felicity run it down." Oliver said making it clear that helping her wasn't just a suggestion.

"Wait, what?!" Felicity said echoing Tommy's instant thoughts.

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><p><strong>AN3: Really hope you enjoyed this chapter. I will be going back to more following on from the wingman chat in the last chapter so don't worry - I ship Olicity remember hehe. Please let me know your thoughts good or bad! Reviews really do mean so much to me, thank you!<strong>


	20. Chapter 20

**AN: Please be aware, this chapter covers flashback nightmares of the torture previously mentioned. Again, it is line with levels on the show but if you are sensitive to this material please exercise caution. Thank you.**

**AN2: Thank you all hugely for sticking with me and this fic. Your continued reviews, follows, and favs are like gold to me!**

**Disclaimer: You all know the score by now, Arrow owns CW, I don't.**

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><p><em>"Wait, what?!" Felicity said echoing Tommy's instant thoughts.<em>

**Tommy's POV**

Despite the fact that Tommy had actually secretly quite liked computer science at school that was a whole other ball game to playing in Felicity's world! However, Oliver's stubbornness had yet to let up and no way was Tommy going to make it easy for him. Still watching Oliver and Felicity battle it out had been quite funny – not that he'd let either of them see that he'd been amused by it! Tommy had caught Diggle's eye a couple of times though and it was clear he was also amused by them. _When are these two going to figure out how much they like each other?! _It appeared that Oliver had yet to accept their little chat from the other night and it seemed Tommy would still have more work to do as wingman – assuming he survived dealing with Felicity and her computers!

Tommy had started out badly with Felicity by breaking one of her cardinal rules (saying bad stuff about Oliver). He'd only been lucky enough to survive that time because, as Diggle had put it, she'd taken pity on him. So there was _no way _he wanted to risk himself by breaking her other rule! In fact to ensure he didn't, Tommy had been making a point to stay as far away from her babies as he possibly could when Felicity wasn't there – and been pretty careful when she was there too.

Still, if Oliver was going to make Tommy risk life and limb by touching Felicity's computers then he was going to have a little fun of his own Tommy decided. Oliver wanted him working with Felicity, fine, but he was damn well gonna make sure he used that time to his advantage - Oliver was definitely getting a wingman whether he wanted it or not!

Despite finally agreeing to let Tommy work with her, Felicity remained highly possessive of her precious computers so over the next couple of days Felicity had set Tommy up with a computer on a separate desk instead. She had then walked him through inputting and running the searches, and then sending the results to Felicity's mainframe so Felicity could combine them with all the other things she was running. The program that she'd been using originally wasn't allowing for enough of a detailed comparison so Felicity had written a new program specifically to search for more varied and smaller commonalities between the names on the list. Even so, it was hard going and kept Tommy more than occupied running them all.

Between doing that, managing Verdant, and running interference for Oliver with his family (and to a lesser extent Laurel), Tommy had been left with no time to hunt for an apartment so he was still staying at the Mansion – when he wasn't crashing at the lair.

Oliver had chucked him off his sofa though so Tommy was now staying in one of the spare rooms just down the hall from Oliver's bedroom, close enough to hear when his friend was having yet another nightmare – of which there'd been many since his capture by _that man_. Tommy and Oliver would talk afterwards, sometimes about the nightmares themselves, at other times they would talk about funny things from their past or whatever Oliver needed talk about to distract him from them. Tommy was careful to be guided by Oliver at these times and didn't want to push him too hard. Yet at the same time he knew that Oliver had to deal with everything he'd been through if he was ever to properly move on.

_Pot kettle! _Tommy couldn't help thinking – since witnessing Oliver's torture he had had no few nightmares himself. It appeared that tonight was his turn again Tommy thought as he awoke in a cold sweat with Oliver standing next to him shaking him back to reality.

"...it's alright Tommy, I'm here, I'm alive, I'm okay." He registered Oliver was speaking to him trying to reassure him.

Tommy sat bolt upright still shaking and sunk his head onto his hands. The nightmare had been so vivid he was having a little trouble adjusting to reality again. Oliver passed him a glass of water which he accepted gratefully.

"Thanks."

"Did you want to talk about it?" Oliver asked in a cautious but calm tone.

"What's to talk about, I saw him torturing you, again." Tommy replied bluntly.

Oliver sat down on the floor with his back against the wall and just waited silently. Tommy didn't know how he did it, but somehow Oliver managed to encourage him to talk whilst putting absolutely no pressure on him at all. Tommy noticed that Oliver was careful to face away from him and he was grateful for that, it was easier to talk without having to look into his face – especially when he had just seen that face screaming in agony. Tommy took a few deep breaths careful to let them out slowly as Oliver had shown him. After a few minutes of companionable silence Tommy continued talking.

"We couldn't find you, couldn't get to you. He just kept going and getting worse. You were dying Oliver and there was nothing I could do about it. And _my father _was just laughing. He was _amused _by your pain Oliver."

"That's not what happened though. You guys did find me, _you _distracted him Tommy, and I got away. I'm okay Tommy really, I'm okay."

Tommy still had issues with Oliver's definition of 'okay', but didn't have the energy to pursue it right now. "This time."

Oliver looked at him questioningly.

"You were okay _this time _Oliver, what about the next time or the one after that?! Diggle and Felicity have both told me how many times you've come close to dying since you got back – and how many times _my father _has been responsible for it, _it was my father Oliver!_"

"Tommy do you blame me for my mother's involvement in the Undertaking?"

Tommy was thrown by the change of subject. "No." He replied warily.

"So I'm not responsible for her actions?" Oliver persisted.

"No Oliver, of course not." Tommy said more forcefully.

"So if I'm not responsible for the actions of my mother, how can you be responsible for the actions of your father?" Oliver stated bluntly.

Yet again Tommy was struck by Oliver's mind-reading capabilities. He'd managed to deal adeptly with an issue that Tommy hadn't even realised was bugging him. Yet Oliver was right, he had been feeling guilty and knotted up inside about the fact that it was his father who had done this and not some stranger. He still couldn't understand how he could do that to his son's best friend, someone he'd watched grow up from childhood, but was starting to accept that he may never get an answer to that question.

Still he was scared about how much longer Oliver could go on playing the odds like this before he did die for real this time. Even if they defeated _that man _it was painfully clear from the length of the List that there was no shortage of bad guys out there who needed to be taken down. It was just as clear that the SCPD weren't equipped to deal with most of them, and that Oliver felt like it was his responsibility. Not for the first time Tommy wished that Robert Queen had never forced that promise from Oliver. If he was honest with himself though he knew that the man who had come back from the Island would never have been able to leave it alone even if Robert hadn't asked it of him.

Tommy realised that sleep was going to stay away for the rest of the night, or morning as it was now 5 a.m. Working in the club and the lair had skewed his body clock though so this was still desperately early for him. He could see that Oliver was unlikely to go back to sleep either so by mutual agreement they decided to go down to the kitchen and see if Raisa had left anything they could raid.

"I think Raisa said she'd put some of the left over oladie in the pantry for me." Oliver said with a smile on his face." Since Raisa found out that Oliver now spoke Russian she'd taken to making Russian sweets for him and had soon discovered that oladie was one of his favourites as it was healthy as well as delicious. Tommy still thought it was an acquired taste, but it was growing on him. To be honest he just enjoyed raiding the pantry with his friend like they had always done and it helped him to switch off from the images still going through his head from the nightmare/security feed. Yet again Oliver seemed to realize what Tommy needed without him having to verbalise it.

Once they'd polished off all the oladie and had several strong shots of caffeine Oliver decided they may as well head to the lair and get an early start.

"You can go through the results of Felicity's searches from last night too. Maybe this time we'll have found something." Oliver said on the way there.

"Whoa hey, I agreed to getting a head-start on the next load of names on the list – not to going on Felicity's computers!" Tommy objected.

"Come on Tommy it'll be fine."

"Oliver, you are my best friend and there's a not much I wouldn't do to help you – but touching Felicity's babies without her there is one of those things!" Tommy insisted.

"You do realise they're not actually babies right?"

"Ha – you can tell her that then, coz I'm not!" Much as he was enjoying the banter he still valued his life way too highly to risk crossing Felicity. "Look, there's no way Felicity will be there yet and you know what she's like about anybody messing with her babies." Tommy made a point of using the word again to reinforce his point. No matter what Oliver thought that's how Felicity treated them.

"Tommy, you've been working on them with her!" Oliver replied in a mildly exasperated tone as they entered the empty lair still continuing to argue.

"Yeah, _with her _being the operative words! Not on my own, and especially not without her even being in the building!"

"Tommy!" Oliver was definitely exasperated now.

"Okay, but you're taking the blame Oliver coz there's no way that going near Felicity's computers without her here is a good idea!" Tommy said vehemently.

"What's not a good idea?" Diggle asked. _Again with the not jumping and appearing from nowhere! _Tommy thought as he was thrown by Diggle's silent appearance.

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><p><strong>AN3: If any of you are wondering what oladie is I looked it up on Google. Apparently it's a thick pancake that can be served with anything, but is made from very healthy ingredients.<strong>

**AN4: Please do let me know what you think - good or bad, thanks all! :)**


	21. Chapter 21

**AN: Thanks you so much for sticking with me & continuing to review. Very grateful for all your help Rennie75 as always, thanks for the super fast turnarounds on these chapters too!**

**Disclaimer: I know, I know - CW owns Arrow, I don't.**

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><p><em>"What's not a good idea?" Diggle asked. Again with the not jumping and appearing from nowhere! Tommy thought as he was thrown by Diggle's silent appearance.<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

_Hadn't the lair been empty? _Much as Tommy was still trying to figure out how a guy that big could move that silently, he decided it wasn't relevant right now.

"Me checking Felicity's computers."

"Whoa, definitely _not_ a good idea!" Diggle agreed.

"He's only going to check the search results Felicity set running last night." Oliver said pointedly.

"Yeah but you _know_ how protective she is of her babies." Diggle objected.

Tommy had to smother a laugh at Oliver's glare when Diggle unwittingly used the very same term they'd been arguing about only moments before. From the way the glare switched to him though it was clear he hadn't been all that successful in smothering it. _Tough._

"See, he thinks it's a bad idea too." Tommy said quickly capitalising on the support.

"Fine." Oliver huffed with an exaggerated sigh. "But if you're not going to check the search results then we are going to work on your training." Oliver finished with a gleam in his eyes that had Tommy distinctly worried**.**

_So much for the win!_ "But I was going to get the next batch of names off the List running." Tommy tried not really expecting to be successful, but not willing to just give in without a fight either.

"Now Tommy." Oliver growled in his Arrow voice making it clear that there would be no more arguments.

Tommy had agreed some weeks back that as well as getting some medical training, it would be a good idea for him to learn some of the basic self-defence too. He had no desire to actually go out in the field with Oliver or Diggle, but going on the amount of times Felicity had been captured and used against the Arrow Tommy hadn't argued with the logic of learning some basics. However, what he hadn't anticipated was just how tough Oliver would be on him though! Something that had very quickly been demonstrated by the amount of bruises Tommy had ended up with already. _More bruises to go along with the lack of sleep, just what I need!_

Looking at Oliver's face now it was abundantly clear that even in his injured state Oliver intended to make sure that Tommy didn't get off lightly today either. _Oh shit!_ Tommy sent a silent plea for help Diggle's way. He might not have wanted to risk crossing Felicity, but he wasn't all that sure that 'training' with Oliver when he was in this mood was all that preferable! Especially since Oliver had just lost the previous argument and he'd never been a great loser when it came to arguments between the two of them growing up. Somehow he doubted that had changed much.

Much to Tommy's immense relief however, Diggle not only saw his plea, but decided to take pity on him.

"I'll train him today Oliver."

Oliver didn't look all that happy with Diggle either now – but at least Diggle had a chance when it came to sparring with Oliver, Tommy on the other hand decidedly did _not_. He decided not to wait to hear Oliver's response but went to get changed straight away. Tommy had already discovered how impractical jeans were for training – and that Oliver never made allowances for anything, let alone clothes. Since then he had made sure that he had a spare pair of combats at the lair at all times for impromptu training sessions, like now.

Tommy came back from getting changed and was completely thrown for a minute as Oliver was nowhere to be seen. He looked at Diggle questioningly, but in reply Diggle just looked up. He followed his eye-line to see Oliver up amongst the structural beams doing some kind of push**-**ups using the beams themselves as handholds. Tommy thought back to Diggle's comment about push**-**ups being too easy for Oliver way back when Oliver had first brought him down into the lair. _Guess he found a way to make them harder._ Tommy thought wryly.

As always, Oliver was shirtless. Initially Tommy had been thrown by that, but he was getting used to it now and to seeing his scars all the time. He had come to understand that part of Oliver not having to hide any aspect of himself or be fake in any way when in the lair also meant not having to hide his scars either. _The way that Felicity drools over him every time doesn't hurt either._

However, Tommy was definitely _not_ used to all the new bruising and scarring that Oliver now had from _that man_. The purple bruises had now faded only to be replaced by browns and yellows which covered his entire torso. Tommy had to keep repeating to himself that he was not to blame for _that man's _actions. Somehow he knew it would be a good while yet before he was able to fully accept the truth of that statement though, despite what Oliver had said.

Although training with Diggle was definitely preferable to training with Oliver, the older man took the task of teaching Tommy way too seriously to go easy on him either. So by the time Felicity arrived (thankfully earlier than he'd expected) Tommy was utterly exhausted, covered in sweat, and he knew that he would be sporting his own collection of bruises by the end of the day. He was therefore truly grateful to Felicity for taking only one look at his face before declaring that it was time for Tommy to do some _real work_ and help her go through all the results which the latest round of searches had found.

Diggle, and Oliver for that matter, were less than impressed with Felicity for interrupting the training session yet neither of them argued with her. _Nothing new there_. Nevertheless, Tommy was quick to make his escape before they changed their minds!

Unfortunately the latest round of results still afforded them no new information that they could actually use. Tommy was beginning to think that they were going to run out of time and the Undertaking was going to take place before they got anywhere. It was abundantly apparent the others were worried about that too. More for something to do than anything else, Tommy picked up the notebook containing the List and began to flick through it.

He turned to the page at the front with the logo/picture thing on. Despite their best efforts none of them had been able to identify it or figure out what it meant. Tommy was certain it was relevant somehow and that he had seen it somewhere before, but he was still unable to remember _where_. He stood there staring at it in the hope that _this time_ he would finally remember how/why he knew it.

"You're gonna wear that thing out if you keep staring at it like that." Diggle observed.

Much to Tommy's surprise Oliver let out a little laugh in response.

"Slade said that to me once about the photo of Laurel." Oliver explained seeing their blank faces.

Tommy was struck by the fact that he no longer found it weird when Oliver talked about Laurel that way even though she was now with him instead. It wasn't all that long ago that he'd wondered out loud to Oliver and Laurel how long it would be before this wasn't weird any more. He remembered that Oliver had stated it wasn't weird at all and then all three of them had started laughing. _That was the first time I heard a genuine laugh from him since the Island._

Oliver stopped sparring with Diggle (having taken Tommy's place after Felicity rescued him) and came over to where Tommy was standing next to Felicity and her bank of computers. Oliver looked at the image too before looking at Felicity.

"_That's it!_" Oliver suddenly exclaimed triumphantly

"What?!" Felicity got in before either he or Diggle had a chance to even open their mouths.

"That's where we've seen it before. Felicity, it's right there!" Oliver said pointing not at Felicity as Tommy had first thought, but right past her at one of her computer screens instead where a map of Starling City was displayed.

Tommy looked at the map for a minute before seeing what Oliver had – it was an image from the map itself of an area in the Glades. The area where his mother had been killed all those years before. _That's why I recognized it!_

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><p><strong>AN2: Hope you liked it peeps? Do me a favour &amp; let me know what you think - and what you'd like to see coming next!<strong>


	22. Chapter 22

**AN: Instead of being all from Tommy's POV this time, mixed POV's were needed to make this flow correctly. I hope it reads ok & makes sense. I transcribed some of the dialogue from the episodes myself, however I have made changes to make it fit my version of the story. Thank you Rennie75 for putting up with me inundating you like this! You are a star! All mistakes belong to me not my beta :-)**

**Disclaimer: CW own Arrow and all their scripts etc. I don't.**

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><p><em>Tommy looked at the map for a minute before seeing what Oliver had – it was an image from the map itself of an area in the Glades. The area where his mother had been killed all those years before. That's why I recognized it!<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

Despite now realising that the logo was of the Glades and it was clear that was significant they still had a lot of work to do to stop the Undertaking itself. Not least of which being tracking down that damned device! Oliver was so determined – they all were – but Oliver seemed to be on more of a mission about this than anything he'd ever known or seen. He had therefore insisted that they step up Tommy's training. With the Undertaking so close they needed every advantage they could get.

However, after being hit for what felt like the dozenth time in a row Tommy was incredibly relieved when Diggle agreed to take a break. It wasn't that he wasn't trying, but how on earth was he meant to concentrate with Oliver parkouring all over the lair! Every time Tommy thought Oliver couldn't surprise him he would come up with yet something else he could do, leaving Tommy feeling bemused or stunned all over again. _Maybe there really is nothing he can't do anymore._

Tommy sat back near Felicity (having already discovered that when Oliver needed to work off energy like this that was the safest place to be) and watched, amazed. It was like his friend should be in a circus when he was like this! Tommy had stopped worrying about Oliver getting injured doing his parkour act. _Another phrase I never thought I'd actually use – least not about somebody I actually know._

It was clear that no matter how crazy it all looked Oliver was in complete control – even if he was using water pipes like monkey bars and springing from the floor to the table to suddenly way up high in the beams way over their heads. Tommy could see why Felicity watched Oliver so much, it was amazing to watch. Although of course Tommy knew that certainly wasn't the only reason Felicity watched him, even if she wouldn't admit to it yet either!

Later on after Diggle and Felicity had left the lair Tommy asked Oliver about his utter determination. About why – apart from saving all those lives of course – he was so determined that it had to be him who stopped the Undertaking_._

Oliver replied with passion. "When you father captured me one of the things he said was that no-one can stop what's about to come, not even _the Vigilante_. I can't let him be right, Merlyn's plan's what I returned from the Island to stop Tommy. It's what my father really wanted when he told me to right his wrongs!"

"Okay, I get that, but you can't do this alone Oliver."

"I know." Oliver replied with a sigh. "We're going to need more help." He picked up the cell with the voice changer. "Time to call in some back-up."

"Hello Detective_**.**_"

_Oliver's idea of back-up was calling Laurel's father? What was it about involving all of their fathers in this?!" _Oliver put the cell on speaker so that Tommy could hear the conversation too. Tommy nodded to show he understood he had to be quiet. The last thing they needed was for Lance to start chasing him/someone else down now as well.

"It's funny you should call I got your trusty sidekick sitting right in front of me."

"Felicity?" Tommy mouthed silently to Oliver in query. Oliver just shrugged in return, he had no idea what Lance was doing with Felicity either; and had no intention of giving the Detective anything on her.

"I don't have a sidekick when I need help I call you. Malcolm Merlyn plans to level the Glades with a man-made earthquake using technology from Unidac Industries."

"What?" Lance gave a short humourless laugh. "Well now you're just trying to have some fun with me."

Oliver continued, completely ignoring Lance's comment. "I don't know what Merlyn's timetable is so you need to evacuate the Glades immediately_**. **_Get as many people to safety as you can. Whatever you think of me Detective please … believe this." Oliver hung up with a sigh looking at Tommy.

"Let's hope he takes you seriously and realises we have bigger problems right now than whatever led him to Felicity." Tommy said in answer to Oliver's look. "Like my father. "

"Our fathers. They made a plan together to destroy the Glades. Your father's going to do it because he thinks it will avenge your mother's death."_How _does _Oliver always know what I'm thinking?!_"The difference between us Tommy is that I didn't find out the truth about my father until it was too late, but you've always known deep down. You have always known the man he is."

Tommy knew that Oliver was right, he'd always known that there was _something _with _that _man, known how uncompromising he was and how ruthless when it came to business. But that was still very different to finding out what that thing was and that the ruthlessness wasn't just limited to the business world. Tommy was still trying to process that truth, let along actually being able to deal with it.

Tommy nodded. "And that's why I've got to stop him Oliver, I can't let him do this either." He finished determinedly. "Our fathers started this, maybe we can make them stop it … I'm going to go see him Oliver."

"Be careful, you know how dangerous he can be."

Tommy was relieved that Oliver didn't argue, he'd expected more resistance. As for forgetting how dangerous _that man_ was** - **well, somehow he didn't think he was _ever _going to get the images from the damned security feed out of his head, much less forget them. "I know, I have to at least try though."

"Okay" Oliver nodded, giving his agreement. "And I'm going to go talk to my Mom, see if she really does know more than she let on to Diggle."

_**Oliver's POV**_

Oliver got to the Mansion to find his mother in the living room. Time for the conversation he'd put off as long as he could. Truthfully he'd never wanted this to happen. But stopping this was more important than his own feelings.

"No more lies Mom, the Undertaking. We need to stop it." Oliver launched straight in, there was no time for niceties now. _No point messing around._

"Everything I have ever said or done has been to protect you and your sister." His mother insisted.

"What about all those people in the Glades?" Oliver said disbelievingly, how could she possibly be trying to justify this?

"I'm not their mother." She replied bluntly.

Oliver just looked at her, his complete disbelief that she could say that, could be so _cold _showing clearly in his face and eyes. He took a breath, refusing to let her callousness knock him off track.

"I spoke to Malcolm." He said bluntly watching her face keenly to see how she would react, if she was she really scared of Merlyn like she was trying to say.

"You what?!" She was clearly horrified at what he had done. "He could have killed you. He killed your father." She finished with distress showing in her voice.

"No he didn't." Oliver says shaking his head slowly before continuing to tell her the real truth of what had actually happened. "After the Gambit went down Dad and I both made it to the life-raft and then we drifted for days. In the end there wasn't enough food and water for both of us …" He took another breath, refusing to let his emotions have free reign just yet. "... so he shot himself in the head."

"I don't want to hear of this." His mother stated in a small voice trying but failing to stop him continuing.

Oliver knew it was time she knew the whole truth now. He'd protected her up until now, but no more. She needed to know, to _understand _just what had happened. Maybe then he could get through to her.

"He sacrificed himself so that I could live." Oliver let his emotion show through into his voice now, getting louder as he spoke. "Do you really think that I could go on living knowing that you sacrificed thousands more in my name?! Mom, please." He walked towards her, he had to make her see this for the atrocity it was, he _had _to! They were running out of time, they didn't even know just how little time was left – only that Merlyn wouldn't leave it long now. The Unidac massacre had made that clear. "You have to help me stop Malcolm - we need to know where the device is."

Before she could say anything in response Moira's phone rang and she turned away from Oliver to answer it.

"Malcolm."

Oliver's head whipped round in surprise. _Merlyn is calling her, now? It has to be about the Undertaking, maybe this will be the push she needs to tell me where the device is._

"How can I help you?"

Oliver could tell that Moira was struggling to keep her voice even so that Merlyn didn't suspect anything was wrong. He just hoped that Merlyn couldn't tell it as well.

"I see..." She paused listening to whatever he was saying before continuing "… err yes thank you for calling."

"What is it?" Oliver almost growled at her.

"Malcolm's accelerated his timetable the Undertaking is … it's happening tonight."

Oliver walked towards door with a look of horror and determination on his face. He knew that this was it, their time had run out. He would have to stop Merlyn himself, one way – or another. There was no other option left. As much as he hated to admit it, it was clear his mother wasn't going to help them.

"Where are you going?"

Oliver didn't bother to keep the growl out of his voice this time as he turned back to answer her, staring her straight in the eyes as he spoke. "Somebody in this family needs to put an end to this..." His anger was sharp in his eyes and his utter determination showed as he continued growling his words out. "…whatever the cost." Oliver let show just _what _he meant by that as he held his mother's eyes for a few seconds, before striding past her out of the room and out of the mansion itself.

**AN2: Huge thanks to you all for sticking with me and continuing to follow, fav, & review - you guys keep me writing :-)**


	23. Chapter 23

**AN: OK, wow, what a fabulous response you guys have given me for the last chapter, thank you all so much! **Rennie75 thanks loads for letting me inundate you with beta work and yet still turning all these chapters around so fast - three cheers for Rennie!****

**AN2: Again, multiple POV's were needed to make this flow correctly. As per the last chapter I have transcribed some of the dialogue from the episodes, but then made changes to make it fit my version of the story.**

**Disclaimer: CW own Arrow and all their scripts etc. I don't, shame!**

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><p><em>Oliver didn't bother to keep the growl out of his voice this time as he turned back to answer her, staring her straight in the eyes as he spoke. "Somebody in this family needs to put an end to this..." His anger was sharp in his eyes and his utter determination showed as he continued growling his words out. "…whatever the cost." Oliver let show just <em>what _he meant by that as he held his mother's eyes for a few seconds, before striding past her out of the room and out of the mansion itself._

_**Tommy's POV**_

Whilst Oliver had been meeting with Moira, Tommy had gone to meet with his father. They had already agreed that he would pretend to be pissed at Oliver for something to do with Laurel. _After all, _that man _would believe that easily enough, he'd never had a problem believing the worst of Oliver, even before the Island. _Tommy knew he would have to be careful with what he let on, he needed to remember that _t__hat man _still didn't know he knew Oliver's identity – much less that Tommy was actually a part of Team Arrow itself too now! A fact that he was secretly very proud of as Tommy now had a far better idea of just how much it took for Oliver to truly trust anyone anymore. So for him to allow Tommy become a real part of the team meant a huge deal – and there was no way he was going to let his friend down!

Tommy entered his father's office acting as if he was fuming and bitter. He went straight to the drinks tray and poured himself a scotch which he pretended to drink, being careful to not actually drink any of it. They couldn't afford any slips now. His father was standing by the window and didn't appear to actually be looking at Tommy. But Oliver had taught him enough now to know that just because it didn't _look _like he was looking, that didn't mean he actually wasn't!

"Oliver said you wanted to nuke the Glades or something. It's funny scotch doesn't make it any more believable." Tommy scoffed at his own words as he spoke, looking at the scotch as if confused as to why it wasn't helping. "Maybe after your jihad we can grab some steaks."

Merlyn turned around, facing Tommy before answering in a completely calm voice, as if they were discussing nothing more than the weather. "It's true Tommy. It's the reason I closed your Mother's clinic. I didn't want to see it levelled."

Tommy closed his eyes as he swallowed and shook his head in utter disbelief. Despite everything they had gone through, everything he had seen, somehow he still hadn't been prepared for _that man's _response.

"What?" He knew it, he'd known it was true, but still to hear it – to actually hear him say it, and without even any pretence at hiding - or any doubts in his voice about what he was planning, what he was going to do?! Tommy was utterly stunned and was struggling to think straight and maintain the act.

Merlyn continued speaking normally, as if he hadn't just dropped a huge bombshell on Tommy. "I have something I'd like you to listen to. The night your Mother died, she called me. I woke to a voicemail from her." Merlyn walked over to his desk getting out a player as he spoke.

"Dad-" Tommy tried to interrupt, this was _not _what he was here for.

Merlyn just continued as if Tommy hadn't even spoken. "Her final gift to me."

"Malcolm I'm in trouble, I told, I told them to take everything, my money, my ring."

No matter how much he tried Tommy couldn't block out his mother's voice, her words, said so many years ago but preserved perfectly and as raw with emotion as if it was happening right now. It broke his heart to hear her so.

"Turn it off!" Tommy said desperately, but to no avail.

"He shot me I screamed for help but no one would come." Tommy heard his father echoing those last words as his mother's voice continued to play. "Oh God Malcolm I don't want to die alone." Tommy could tell how much pain she must have been in as she choked out the words. He wanted nothing more right then than to take back the last five minutes, to go back before he heard that awful recording. Tommy knew it was another thing he would _never _get out of his mind.

Merlyn spoke bitterly "She bled out into the pavement while people passed and did nothing. Your mother built her clinic in the Glades because she wanted to save this city." His bitterness grew as he continued to speak. "It can't be saved, because the people there don't want to be saved."

"So you kill them all?" In spite of all their planning Tommy couldn't help but be emotional as he asked the horrendous question. He couldn't reconcile this man, this _killer_, with the father he'd known. Every time Tommy thought he was even starting to deal with his actions even more horrendous ones would come to light. _Just how many people had he killed?! _He had barely finished speaking though before Merlyn shouted back in bitter anger, making him flinch viciously.

"Yes! They deserve to die all of them! The way she died!"

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><p><strong>AN3: Sorry this one is a little shorter, more coming very soon though, I promise :) If you like my work you know what to do ... the Muse is fed by reviews :-D<strong>


	24. Chapter 24

**AN: Thank you all so much for sticking with me and for your reviews! Same as before, some of the dialogue has been transcribed by me from the episodes myself, but have made changes to make it fit my version of the story.**

**Disclaimer: Arrow and all their scripts etc are still owned by CW, not me.**

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><p>"<em>Yes! They deserve to die all of them! The way she died!"<em>

_**Oliver's POV**_

After walking out of the Mansion he had returned to the lair. Oliver didn't know what his next move would be, just knew that he would need Felicity and Diggle regardless. Thankfully whilst he had been gone the pair had been working and had some good news for him. _Finally a break! _He sighed in relief as they explained it to him. As usual Felicity's explanation was way too technical for him to follow completely, but Oliver understood the important part - she'd figured out the rough location of the Markov device.

"The old 10th street railway line. Dollars to donuts it's somewhere down there." Felicity said proud of her deductive skills.

Oliver nodded admiringly, before suddenly taking in what she'd said. _The old 10th street railway line... _"I know where it is." He said much to their surprise, before explaining that that was right by where MrsMerlyn had been killed.

Just then Thea rang. Her voice was upset and panicky as she told Oliver their Mom was giving a press conference, on all channels from the look of it. He asked Felicity to turn the television so they could watch too. Oliver was surprised to discover that even if he hadn't been able to get the location of the device out of her, it appeared she _had _been listening to at least some of what he'd had to say. At the same time Oliver was starting to worry that he hadn't heard back from Tommy yet. He just hoped that they weren't watching the conference too, there was no telling how Merlyn would react to his plans being thwarted and made public like that! He knew the police would be on their way to arrest Merlyn, but there was no way they would be able to handle what, who they were going up against. Oliver knew he had to get there, and fast.

_**Tommy's POV**_

Tommy and his father stood in front of the television as Moira Queen told the whole city what was going on. He was having trouble believing what she was saying, the amount of people she said she had proof that _that man _had killed. _Look at what you've __seen_**, **_what__ he's been willing to do though, even to your best friend. _Tommy jumped, scared, as Merlyn furiously, smashed his fist onto his desk breaking something in the process. Tommy realised he was ashamed to be his son, to have any connection to him whatsoever at that moment. Yet he couldn't let what Oliver's Mom had accused him of go by without calling him on it, even though he wasn't sure he wanted the answer.

"Is it true? Did you kill all those people?!" Tommy asked, visibly shaken by what he had just heard, just seen.

"I did what I had to do." Merlyn replied flatly.

Tommy couldn't understand how he could be like that, talk like that. There wasn't even a _hint _of regret or remorse in his voice. Tommy watched him go over to a painting on the wall which he slid to the side, revealing a hidden access panel. _Now what? _Merlyn unlocked the panel, pulling it back to reveal all the Dark Archer gear. It was like seeing a mirror of Oliver's arsenal, but in black this time – and despite the smaller area there was more of it.

Before he could even start to take all that in, to register what _that man _was choosing to show him, an entire police SWAT team arrived and started shouting instructions.

"Freeze! Malcolm Merlyn you are under arrest."

Tommy took a few steps back, panicking slightly but knowing that he had to head towards the cops. Somewhere in the depths of his brain he registered that he would never have been able to process this that logically before Oliver and Diggle had started to train him. Maybe he had taken in more than he'd thought after all.

At the same time Merlyn dove into his lair completely ignoring the orders of the police officer.

"Don't move!" The officer shouted, but Merlyn continued to ignore him as he disappeared into his lair.

Tommy had to make a real effort to control his breathing as he dived for cover. He knew he had to keep focused on what was going on as guns were now firing madly towards _that man's _lair. He knew that there was no way this was going to end well. These guys might be SWAT but he knew what Oliver was like and somehow _this man _had managed to totally defeat him every time they'd fought. SWAT didn't stand a chance.

Tommy knew his instincts had been right when Merlyn came back out bare seconds later armed with a _machete _– _What the hell? - _and started killing the cops. He paid no attention whatsoever to the bullets madly flying everywhere, or even the fact that Tommy was there, it was as if neither of those things were of any import to him at all.

"Dad NO!" Tommy yelled in horror at the sight of his father slaughtering all the police officers with no hesitation and giving no mercy. He knew that Oliver killed too – but only when he had no choice and only the bad guys, people who had hurt others, not those who were willing to sacrifice their own lives to _save _others! What Oliver did was a last resort when it was necessary, but what _that man_ was doing was murder!

Merlyn kept on killing regardless though and ended up standing directly in front of Tommy. At some point, he wasn't quite sure when, Tommy had taken a gun from one of the now dead cops and he now held it in his hands. He raised the gun and pointed it straight at his father, attempting to remember and mimic the way that Diggle had shown him to aim a gun. Somehow he doubted he was getting it right though. They had been right, this _was much _harder in the middle of a real situation. _How does Oliver aim a bow that perfectly with all this adrenaline? I can barely even hold a gun still! _Tommy kept the gun aimed on _that man _as best he could. He simply couldn't let him do this, commit this horror, this ... this genocide.

"Please Dad!" Tommy implored, taking a few steps back while keeping the gun firmly pointed at Merlyn. "Stay Back! I don't want to hurt you." He was desperate now, he really did _not _want to have to shoot _this man_, shoot his own father, but he could not allow him to get away either. Suddenly he Tommy realised he finally understood the depth of some of Oliver's determination as he now felt the same.

"You can't – and you can't stop me." Merlyn replied calmly yet arrogantly, utterly sure of himself and his plans, of his own superiority. Before Tommy could do anything else, or even realise what was happening though, Merlyn had taken the gun from him and was raising the base of the machete's hilt towards his face. The last thing Tommy was aware of was a sharp pain to his face and his last thought before he passed out was that he had been hit by the hilt of the machete. Everything went dark very quickly as Tommy collapsed onto the floor.

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><p><strong>AN2: Please let me know what you think, thank you!<strong>


	25. Chapter 25

**AN: Same as before, some of the dialogue has been transcribed by me from the episodes myself, but have made changes to make it fit my version of the story. **

**AN2: This time I've not written it from one specific POV as there is too much back & forth in this chapter to make that work, so there will not be headings to show whose POV it is in this chapter**

**Disclaimer: Arrow and all their scripts etc are still owned by CW, not me.**

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><p><em>The last thing Tommy was aware of was a sharp pain to his face and his last thought before he passed out was that he had been hit by the hilt of the machete. Everything went dark very quickly as Tommy collapsed onto the floor.<em>

_. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ._

"Oliver I'm sorry" Felicity said hesitantly, her voiced filled with sympathy after they had just finished watching Moira Queen give her press conference and being arrested by the police.

"Don't be. She gave those people a chance." Oliver replied, meaning it, at least now some of those people would survive, they would have a chance. He walked towards the trunk he had brought back with him from the Island.

"I thought Merlyn broke your bow?" Diggle queried with confusion in his voice. It was clear Oliver planned to head out, but how he intended to stop Merlyn without even a bow was beyond Diggle. After all, Oliver hadn't been able to defeat him when he _did _have a bow.

"I have another." Oliver said opening the trunk and taking out the bow from the Island. Yao Fei's bow, Shado's bow, the first bow he had ever used. He had survived five years of hell with that bow, killed Fyres with it, so maybe just maybe he would be able to use it to take down Merlyn as well - even if he knew he would die in the process too.

"I was going over the device schematics. The device can be set with a timed detonation or can be remote activated by a mobile transmitter." Felicity moved the conversation on instead of querying him on the bow, something for which he was very grateful.

"Something Merlyn could have on him." Oliver said understanding what Felicity was getting at.

"Listen Oliver if we can just get our hands … on this transmitter maybe we don't need to track down the device." Diggle said, but Oliver knew he was clutching at straws and it was just too risky to take that chance with a man like Merlyn.

"It's too big of an if Diggle. I need you in the subway. Find the device. Disarm it." Oliver spoke in what Felicity called his Arrow voice, making it clear these were his orders and not up for discussion.

**"**So you can take on Merlyn by yourself?!" Diggle said disbelievingly. He knew that Oliver would do whatever he had to, whatever it took to take down Merlyn and prevent the destruction of the Glades – but going up against him alone was suicide and Oliver knew it! Oliver might be giving orders, but Diggle wasn't going to just let the younger man commit what was tantamount to suicide if he could do anything to prevent it.

Oliver sighed briefly, looking down and away from Diggle's eyes before replying. He knew the older man wouldn't like his reply, but it didn't change it, couldn't change it. No matter what this had to end. This is what he'd come back from the Island to stop, what he'd survived the Island for. His own life, wasn't important now, saving the city was.

"I have to."

"Oh he'll kill you Oliver." Diggle said without a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

They both knew it was true, Merlyn would kill Oliver if he went up against him alone again, especially on the night of the Undertaking. Oliver met Diggle's eyes, he had to let him see he understood, he knew the stakes all to**o **well.

"I know."

Diggle just swallowed, looking at his friend in despair. He knew there was no way he was going to talk Oliver out of it.

"He's beaten me twice..." Oliver shook his head as he continued speaking, it was time to be completely honest with his friends. "...and I don't know how to stop him."

Diggle nodded in agreement and understanding. If he wasn't going to talk Oliver out of it though, he was damn well going to make sure he found another way to even the odds, to give Oliver at least a fighting chance.

"Okay well how about this time you bring along something you didn't have the last time the two of you fought. Me." Diggle could see the confusion followed by surprise in Oliver's eyes as he spoke.

"I can't let you." Oliver appreciated the gesture, more than he could say, but he wasn't about to let Diggle sacrifice his life too.

"And I can't let you do this by yourself man. Oliver you are not alone, not since you brought me into this..." Diggle turned and looked at Felicity who gave a small nod, signifying her agreement to him including her "...us into this."

Oliver looked over at Felicity too, she smiled slightly in agreement with Diggle's words. Not for the first time, he wished he'd never brought her into this, into his world of murk and death. But the fact remained that without her much of what they'd done simply wouldn't have been possible – and tracking down the Markov device wouldn't have been either. He just hoped she realised how important she was to him – and not just for her skills with a computer.

"Besides, army regulations – a soldier never lets a brother go into battle alone." Diggle continued, making it clear that this time he was the one who wouldn't accept any argument. Diggle held his hand out to Oliver.

Oliver paused, looking at Diggle's hand, his face and the conviction in it. He realised that Diggle wasn't going to back out of this, couldn't back out of this, any more than he could. He reached out his hand too and clasped Diggle's solidly accepting his help.

"I'm out of bows." Oliver said slightly seriously, but still making a small attempt to lighten the moment.

"I've got my gun." Diggle responded in kind.

"Guess it's up to me to do the dismantling." Felicity said to looks of horror from both Oliver and Diggle. Didn't she understand how much he cared for her - _loved her, he could hear his mind supplying in Tommy's voice -_how important she was to him? Leaving her here would put her in more danger than ever before and neither he nor Digg would be around to rescue her.

"This whole area is ground zero, I want you out of here." Oliver stated determinedly.

"If you're not leaving I'm not leaving."

Unfortunately Felicity could be just as stubborn and determined as him, if not more so.

"Besides if I don't deactivate the device who will." Felicity finished pointedly and slightly triumphantly, she knew she had won this argument.

Fine, if Felicity was going to be like that he knew he wouldn't be able to convince her otherwise. But that still didn't mean he was going to let her wonder around the Glades looking for the device. Who knew what safeguards or traps Merlyn might have laid. Oliver walked past Diggle and Felicity and picked up the phone he used to contact Detective Lance.

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><p><strong>AN3:<strong>


	26. Chapter 26

**AN: Back to multiple POV's again. Same as before, I've transcribed some of the dialogue directly from the episodes myself, but then changed/added to it where appropriate to make it fit my version of the story. Massive thanks to Rennie for beta-ing 5 chapters in one day, all mistakes remain mine though!**

**Disclaimer: Arrow and all their scripts etc are still owned by CW, not me.**

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><p><em>Oliver walked past Diggle and Felicity and picked up the phone he used to contact Detective Lance.<em>

_**Oliver's POV**_

He just hoped the Detective would still be willing to listen, to help, after everything he'd just been told. He knew he was risking Lance's life by involving him, but he had no choice. He simply could not, _would not, _allow Felicity to be the one out there looking.

"You were right." Lance said as soon as he answered the phone.

"I need one more thing from you." Oliver knew he was taking a chance but there was no time left for messing around.

"Yeah, what I got left to give?!" Lance replied resignedly, making Oliver wonder what else had happened but he knew he had no time to ask.

"I know where Merlyn is keeping the device. It's in an abandoned subway station near Papp Street."

"How do you know?" Lance replied. Oliver had been truthful with him about everything, but he knew he couldn't expect the Detective to deal with this without having all the information he needed.

"That's where his wife was murdered. I need someone I can _trust _to deactivate the device." Oliver paused briefly looking at Felicity for confirmation that she would go along with this. He waited briefly for her to nod before he continued. "We have a mutual friend who I think could ... talk you through it." He worried that Felicity was still going to argue for being out there deactivating it personally, but justhoped that she would agree to talking the Detective through it instead. He wasn't sure that Verdant would be much safer if the device activated, but at least he would know where she was.

"She says you care about the people of this city. That it needs you." Oliver could hear the need for reassurance in the Detective's voice, the hope that trusting the Vigilante would be the right choice, but had no time to provide reassurances.

"Right now Detective, it needs you."

Oliver ended the call before gearing up to head out with Diggle who had gotten ready whilst Oliver was calling Lance. He still wasn't keen on leaving Felicity alone, but he had nobody left in the Team to stay with her. Also, the longer it went since he had heard from Tommy the more worried he was getting. Tommy would not have willingly gone this long without checking in, not with everything that was going on. Oliver just hoped he wouldn't be too late, that his friend would still be alive. He didn't trust Merlyn not to have killed his own son if he got in his way – and he knew just how stubborn Tommy could be when he wanted, knew that he wouldn't have backed down, not on this.

They arrived at Merlyn Global to find bodies everywhere. Oliver found Tommy lying prone on the floor unconscious, with a nasty bleeding gash right across his cheek. Oliver immediately crouched down next to him checking him over. Apparently his instincts had been right, Tommy had refused to back down. At least he was still alive though and from the look of his pulse he wasn't really injured apart from that gash. Oliver was glad that his vision was acute enough to see a pulse without having to waste precious time physically checking for one anymore.

"Tommy? Tommy!" He called urgently trying to bring him back to consciousness.

"Oliver." Tommy replied in a clear but weak voice.

"Where's your father?" Oliver needed to know if it was safe, if Merlyn had already left.

"I don't know. You were right. You were right about him." Oliver could see how important and how hard it was for Tommy to say those words, so he ignored Diggle until Tommy had finished speaking.

Diggle was standing by a crack in the wall waiting to get Oliver's attention. He called quietly as soon as Tommy finished speaking. _"_Oliver."

"Are you going to kill him?" Tommy asked Oliver, looking him straight in the eyes and asking the one question Oliver had hoped above all else that Tommy _wouldn't _ask.

Oliver couldn't lie, not now when he knew this may be the last chance he had to speak to his best friend. "Get to safety." Oliver simply said instead, dodging the question and hoping Tommy wouldn't call him on it this time.

Tommy nodded getting up slowly and leaving. Oliver got up to and went over to Diggle to see what he had found.

"Looks like a false wall." Diggle said putting his fingers into the gap and opening it with Oliver's help to reveal what was clearly Merlyn's lair. Oliver was surprised and slightly daunted by the sheer volume of the arsenal contained therein, he was glad that he wasn't fighting alone this time. As he quickly glanced around Merlyn stepped out from behind a wall. He was dressed in his full Dark Archer gear.

"Welcome gentlemen. I've been waiting for you. I wanted to see you watch your city die." Merlyn spoke in a cold voice that was clearly anticipating the destruction he was convinced was about to come.

_Not if I can do anything about it! _Oliver thought, unwavering in his determination that this time Merlyn would not come out victorious.

"Where's the transmitter?" Oliver wasn't going to give Merlyn the satisfaction of playing his game or responding to his comments about watching the death of his city.

"Somewhere I can easily get to it." Merlyn was just as resolute that _nothing _was going to get in the way of his plans.

**_Diggle's POV_**

"I doubt it, you'll be too dead." Diggle replied as an all out fight started. Each as intent as the other that they were not going to give way. There were arrows and bullets flying everywhere. Despite having been told of the skill, Diggle was stunned to see Merlyn and Oliver each catching the other's arrows with barely milliseconds to spare before they would have been hit. Even though it was two against one somehow Merlyn still had the upper hand. Merlyn interspersed firing the arrows with throwing them in just as deadly a manner and this time Diggle didn't manage to avoid it in time. It hit him solidly in the chest, taking him down as Oliver yelled out in dismay.

"Digg!"

"Stairs Oliver go, go!" Diggle was struggling to breathe, but still managed to choke out his response urgently enough to make Oliver listen to him. He watched Oliver chase Merlyn up the stairs towards the roof before falling back to the floor in agony.

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><p><strong>AN2: The Muse is fed by reviews - pretty please with a cherry on top!<strong>


	27. Chapter 27

**AN: As before, some of the dialogue is from the original episodes but I have made changes to make it fit my version of the story. Rennie75 is still being my wonderful beta fixing all my inconsistencies & putting up with being inundated by me, all mistakes are mine though!**

**Disclaimer: As Rennie puts it, we still haven't won the lottery so Arrow & all their scripts etc are still owned by CW, not us.**

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><p>"<em>Stairs Oliver go, go!" Diggle was struggling to breathe, but still managed to choke out his response urgently enough to make Oliver listen to him. He watched Oliver chase Merlyn up the stairs towards the roof before falling back to the floor in agony, fighting to stay conscious.<em>

_**Oliver's POV**_

Oliver opened the door to the roof immediately dodging out of the way without bothering to look. He'd learnt enough of Merlyn's fighting style now to know that he would take the shot the second he saw the door move.

"So tell me, are you ready to die? Merlyn said, standing in front of him on the roof.

The fight broke out between them again even faster and more ruthless than before. Arrows flying faster than it seemed humanly possible as both archers were fast closing in on each other. Once they got too close to fire anymore both started using their bows as bo staffs instead. The fleshettes that each had in the holders on their sleeves were thrown between them like daggers, each going for the other's nerve points and main arteries. This was a fight to the death and both archers knew it and met it head on. Neither would back down now, the time for that long since past.

Oliver was taking multiple blows to the face and body and he knew he was bleeding badly, he could feel the blood loss starting to affect him. Merlyn was just so damn _fast_! _Where did he learn to fight like that?! _For every blow Oliver landed it seemed like Merlyn would land two more. He could feel his strength ebbing away and knew he was going on pure adrenaline now. Despite that he didn't slow down, as to do so would have meant his instant death.

Oliver used every technique he had ever learnt from Shado, from Slade, from Yao Fei – as well as a few he hadn't been taught. But no matter how he flipped or kicked, switched up the pace as he'd shown Diggle, he just couldn't seem to pin Merlyn down. Oliver was also worried about Diggle, he'd sent Oliver after Merlyn but still he must be badly hurt not to have made it up to the roof to back Oliver up yet.

With every blow Oliver could feel the damage that Merlyn was inflicting on his body, could feel his ribs cracking with the kicks he was taking. He could feel the crunch of bones from Merlyn's fists, could feel the blood on his face as Merlyn's bow split his cheek. At the same time he could feel his fear crushing him with each jarring hit he took. He didn't expect to come out of this alive, just hoped that he would be able to last long enough for Felicity to talk Lance through deactivating the device. He wasn't sure how much longer he could keep this going though.

Somehow, knowing who Merlyn was made it even harder to fight him – even though it was clear the feeling was not mutual! He knew he had to go for the killing blows, to do anything less was to sign his own death warrant, but to actually _do_ that to a man he'd grown up with, who was like a part of his family? Merlyn was his best friend's father for goodness sake. Oliver held on to his feelings for his Team like a life-raft, the friends who had become like family to him. As hard as it was to fight Tommy's father, it would have been even harder to fail Tommy himself and Oliver kept focussed on that.

Slade had said that caring for others was a weakness they couldn't afford, but Oliver had never agreed with that deep down, something that Diggle had reinforced after Merlyn beat him last Christmas. It was thoughts of his Team, of Diggle, of Tommy, of Felicity, Felicity who was still in the danger-zone that kept him fighting well beyond the natural limits of exhaustion. The one thing Lian Yu had taught him above all else was _survive _and he wasn't about to stop now. Oliver didn't know how Merlyn was still going, but losing was not an option, Oliver was _not _going to fail this city!

Diggle must have finally managed to drag himself up the stairs as Oliver saw him out of his peripheral vision just as Merlyn caught him in a choke hold from behind.

"Don't struggle. This won't hurt. There was never any doubt in the outcome. Don't worry, your mother and sister will be joining you in death." Merlyn's whole voice and attitude was so arrogant and it made Oliver even more angry about what Merlyn was planning to do. Oliver used that anger to feed into his adrenaline and he fought for all he was worth refusing to give in. Despite that, he was close to blacking out, he could hear everything around him getting fainter and yet there is a ringing in his ears that he was all too familiar with. His mind went back again to the last moments of his father's life on that life-raft, to him telling Oliver to "Survive!".

As the memories faded his vision did too and there was now little left of his peripheral vision, he could only focus on was what was directly in front of him. Oliver saw that an arrow was on the ground in front of him, just barely out of reach. He knew from his darkening vision that he had mere seconds left before he passed out so didn't stop to consider how mad his plan was – right now it was all he had. Oliver scrabbled on the ground desperately trying to reach the arrow. He felt his fingers catch the edge of it and grabbed at it for all he was worth. Without pausing to think or brace himself Oliver picked up the arrow and stabbed in straight through his own torso and straight into Merlyn's chest. Groaning in absolute agony Oliver pulled himself off the arrow leaving it embedded deep into Merlyn.

"Thank you for teaching me what I'm fighting for." Oliver ground out, starting to stumble away from Merlyn before turning back to face him. "But my father taught me how!" Seeing that Merlyn was attempting, no matter how weakly, to get back up Oliver punched Merlyn hard with everything he had left in him, knocking him back down to the ground.

It was over, Merlyn had lost – and somehow Oliver was still alive, much to his own surprise.

"Oliver, Lance did it." Felicity's voice came over the comms, shaky but relieved, which added to Oliver's own sense of profound relief.

"It's over." He said to Merlyn, he knew the man had bare seconds left to live, but had to let him know that he'd lost, that his plan had failed.

"If I've learned anything as a successful businessman, it's …"Merlyn coughed out the words, his lungs were filling with blood as he forced out the most damning word Oliver had heard since discovering the existence of the Undertaking "… redundancy." Merlyn fell face down, dead, having used his last breath to prove he hadn't lost after all.

Oliver was filled with terror as he spoke over the comms. "Felicity there's another device. There's two of them." He had barely finished speaking though before the ground started shaking and the sound of explosions broke out everywhere, the second device had activated. He had failed after all. Oliver was filled with despair and horror at the sight in front of them as he and Diggle helped each other to the edge of the roof in time to see the Glades being destroyed in front of them.

"Oliver." Felicity's voice was terrified and Oliver realised she was down there, in the midst of the destruction.

"Are you okay?" He asked her desperately.

"Yeah." Felicity was crying as she spoke, her voice shaking. "The damage seems to be contained on the East Side."

_Laurel!_ CNRI was on the East Side. No matter what Lance was bound to have told her, there was no way Laurel would be anywhere other than her precious CNRI rescuing as much as she possibly could before the police evacuations forced her out, which meant she would still have been there when the device had activated.

"Are you going to be okay?" He asked Diggle desperately, both of them knowing what he was really asking was would Diggle be okay if he left him.

"Go go go." Diggle nodded in response as he spoke, giving Oliver all the encouragement he needed as he sped back down the stairs towards his motorbike, drawing on some unknown resources, aware even as he did so that he was going to crash, badly, the second this was over.

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><p><strong>AN2: Ok, so I have the next few chapters written out already, how fast I upload them is up to you guys - so pleeease follow, fav, &amp; review, thank you! :-D<strong>


	28. Chapter 28

**AN: Continuing to use some of the dialogue is from the original episodes but making changes to make it fit my version of the story. As always huge thanks go to Rennie75 for being such a fab friend & beta (& translating English to American where needed lol!) - all mistakes are on me though.**

**Disclaimer: Doh, still no lottery win means that Arrow & all their scripts etc are owned by CW - more star wishing needed Rennie!**

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><p>"<em>Go go go." Diggle nodded in response as he spoke, giving Oliver all the encouragement he needed as he sped back down the stairs towards his motorbike, drawing on some unknown resources, aware even as he did so that he was going to crash, badly, the second this was over.<em>

_**Tommy's POV**_

Tommy had left Merlyn Global at Oliver's instructions, but instead of getting to safety he knew he had to get to CNRI, to Laurel. Even if Lance had managed to tell her to leave there's no way she would have done so. He made it to CNRI just as the device activated, running inside despite the masonry crashing down all around him and sparks flying everywhere from newly severed electrical cables. He heard Laurel scream just as he got inside.

"Please help me!" The panic and agony were clear in her voice, she must be injured. Tommy followed the sound of her scream clambering over the still falling wreckage as fast as he could. He found her on the floor trapped under a large slab of fallen masonry.

"Tommy! What are you doing here?" It didn't take Oliver's ninja skills for Tommy to easily discern the relief and fear in her voice.

"I kinda figured that you might come back to CNRI." Tommy knew that the chunk of masonry would weigh a ton and that it would need two people to move, yet he had to try. He loved Laurel and couldn't, wouldn't stand by and leave her trapped. He set his stance the way Oliver had told him before starting to heave at it.

"You came here for me?" This time her confusion also showed through into her voice. He could hardly blame her, having distanced himself from her to keep her away from the world of the Vigilante – just as Oliver had done. But now none of that was important, everything else was stripped away and it was suddenly vital to Tommy to let Laurel know what his real feelings for her were.

"I love you." Tommy continued to heave at the masonry for all his worth, stories of mothers releasing children trapped under cars coming to mind as his love for Laurel finally gave him the adrenaline needed to move the masonry and release her from its prison. All around them was chaos and terror as more masonry continued to fall and the earth underneath them was still shaking. Tommy knew their time was running out, fast.

"Go I'm right behind you!" He yelled at Laurel, forcing her to go ahead.

Even if he didn't make it out she had to, Laurel had to be okay, be safe! Tommy was relieved to see her obeying him without argument but before he had a chance to follow more than a step there was a crashing right above his head and he was suddenly thrown to the side as an even larger piece of masonry came down on them.

_**Oliver's POV**_

Oliver made it to CNRI having broken every record in the book for what speeds his bike could do and treating it like a tool for parkour, jumping the bike over any and all obstacles in his way. He pulled up outside just in time to see the whole building exploding and starting to collapse inwards on itself. He could see Laurel being forcibly restrained by Detective Lance and knew instantly that Tommy was still in there, was in trouble.

Oliver ignored everything that reason and logic were dictating, insisting to himself that reason and logic had said he couldn't have survived Lian Yu. He ran in throwing caution and care to the wind, determined that he was going to save his friend. He hadn't come this far just to fail now! Oliver spotted Tommy just as he heard a crashing sound right above their heads and threw himself at Tommy, knocking them both down to the ground as a huge piece of masonry crashed down on top of his back, crushing his legs and trapping them both.

"Oliver?" Tommy coughed weakly in amazement as electrical cables were sparking all around them.

"It's me Tommy, we're going to be fine." Oliver reassured with more confidence in his voice than he actually felt – he knew the odds of them both getting out of there in one piece were slim.

For once Oliver admitted to himself Tommy was right - his definition of 'fine' and 'okay' seriously needed some work! With everything he had been through since going on that boat Oliver had seen far more than his fair share of injuries and situations, and he knew that this was _bad_. The chances of them both surviving were slim, the emergency services would take forever with everything going on outside. Oliver knew if they were to have any chance at all then he would have to get them free, get out from underneath the masonry – somehow.

_**Tommy's POV**_

"Another thing … it seems we gotta disagree on." He tried to smile as he spoke but knew how pathetic the effort was. When Oliver had knocked him to the ground out of the way of the falling masonry Tommy had felt agony flaring in his side. He knew that a piece of something - _re-bar__?_ - had gone through his own side and was bleeding badly. Tommy could tell from the warm fuzzy feeling spreading fast that he would have minutes before he bled out.

Tommy could also see, even in the gloom and flickering light from all the sparking cables, how badly hurt Oliver was. There was blood running down Oliver's jacket from what appears to be a vicious stab wound from an arrow. Tommy knew that the piece of masonry on them both was far bigger than that which had trapped Laurel, and Oliver's legs were being crushed he suspected.

If it had been anybody else with injuries like that Tommy would have given up there and then, there was no way it was possible to lift the masonry back up when they were both trapped and injured underneath it. However, this wasn't anybody else - _it was Oliver! _- since being involved with the Team Tommy had seen just how incredible Oliver's abilities were. He had to believe that they would get out of this and Tommy would do whatever Oliver needed to help them. He couldn't let _t__hat man's _actions be responsible for the death of his best friend, for both their deaths.

"What do you need … to get us out of this, what do you need me to do?" Tommy coughed out, struggling to breathe due to a mixture of the dust, the weight of the masonry, and the pain from the re-bar.

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><p><strong>AN2: I know, I know, poor Tommy right guys? Sorry! Please remember to let me know what you think - thank you! Murgy31 - sorry about the cliffie!<strong>


	29. Chapter 29

**AN: Same as normal, some dialogue is from canon but has been adapted where needed.**

**Disclaimer: You guys know the drill, Arrow & all their scripts etc are still owned by CW, not me.**

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><p>"<em>What do you need … to get us out of this, what do you need me to do?" Tommy coughed out, struggling to breathe due to a mixture of the dust, the weight of the masonry, and the pain from the re-bar.<em>

_**Oliver's POV**_

Oliver struggled to get his arms in front of him, his legs weren't going to be of much use but he knew that if he could just get his arms into the right position, get the right amount of leverage, then he _might _just be able to lift the masonry off of them. Tommy's question caught him by surprise but he realised Tommy was right, he was going to need his help to get them out of this.

"I need to get into a better position so that I can lift this off us long enough for you to get out."

"_Us _to get out!" Tommy said insistently.

Tommy moved his own arms and torso slightly in order to provide Oliver with the leverage he needed.

"Okay, you ready?" Oliver queried. He knew he only had the energy for one attempt so couldn't afford for anything to go wrong.

"Wait..." Tommy said bracing his hands against the masonry "...okay, let's do this."

Oliver was surprised, but not about to turn down the help, he knew he was weak from the injuries he already had and had been close to death himself with Merlyn less than 30 minutes ago. Oliver braced his own arms too as if to do a push up – the hardest and most vital push up of his life. He took a couple of deep breaths and nodded at Tommy as he heaved with everything he was worth finding the strength with a mammoth effort to move it. Pain flared through his body and he groaned with the effort. Tommy cried out in pain just as Oliver finally moved the masonry. Oliver rolled on to his side and taking it over with him so that he didn't end up trapped again.

Moving that masonry purely with his upper body strength and a little help from a severely weakened Tommy had taken more than everything Oliver had. He was swaying as he tried to get to his feet, agony coursing through his body. Oliver knew he wasn't far from collapse and suspected he had broken several bones, as well as cracking yet more ribs. He couldn't give in yet though, they still had to make it back out of there. _Not yet, soon - but not yet!_

Oliver looked at Tommy properly as soon as the flickering light allowed, despairing when the light revealed the piece of re-bar in Tommy's side. Tommy was clearly losing a fair amount of blood, enough to have him very worried. Yet he wasn't going to give up, they had beaten the odds this far after all.

"Tommy." Oliver knew he had to keep Tommy talking, keep him awake if he was going to have any chance of saving him. If Tommy slipped into unconsciousness he doubted he would be able to bring him back.

"Is … is Laurel safe, is Laurel safe? I tried to get her out of here." Tommy asked sounding weaker with every word. The effort to get free had clearly cost Tommy a lot too.

"Yeah, yeah. You did." Oliver nodded at Tommy attempting a smile to cover his panic as he realised that he still had to somehow drag Tommy out of the remains of CNRI.

It was obvious that Tommy wasn't going to be able to move under his own steam. Oliver knew they had very little time left, but despite that realised it was important for Tommy to know he'd succeeded so he continued to speak, reinforcing his words.

"You saved her. Tommy, I'm going to get you out of here, you're gonna be fine."

"Stop. I'm sorry."

_Tommy was apologising? _Oliver was the one that had failed, he hadn't realised Merlyn would have a back-up plan, he was the one who had failed their city – and yet _Tommy _was apologising?

"No, don't apologise." Oliver couldn't stand to hear his friend talking like this when Tommy hadn't been the one who failed, he had.

It was his fault and now there was yet another person he cared about soon to be dead because of him, because of his failure. Oliver grabbed hold of Tommy's arms, ignoring his cries of pain as he began to drag him out of the wreckage, the re-bar still in his side. Oliver knew that to remove it would be more dangerous than leaving it in place.

"I was angry ... and I was jealous. I am my father." Tommy persisted, struggling now to speak as the pain and the blood loss was overwhelming him.

"No, no you're not!" _How could Tommy even think that? _Merlyn had done everything to _destroy _lives, to destroy the Glades and commit genocide; whereas Tommy had done everything to _save _lives, to save Laurel's life even though he must have known going in that his chances of making it back out were minuscule.

"Did you kill him?"

"No." Oliver lied, putting everything he had left into making it sound convincing as he continued to drag Tommy out. They were nearly out now, just a little bit further. "Arghhh." Oliver groaned with the pain and effort. He didn't know how they'd made it this far, but he wasn't about to stop. He couldn't fail Tommy as well.

"Thank you." Tommy sunk into unconsciousness with those words of thanks just as Oliver got them out of the remains of CNRI.

Oliver knew that was it, it was too late, Tommy's injuries too bad. He was filled with more pain than he had ever known. He had failed this city and now his best friend was dying because of it. It was his fault, _i__t was his fault!_

"No, no! Tommy. It should have been me. Open your eyes Tommy!" He choked out the instruction in floods of tears, raw grief making his voice break as he spoke. "Open your eyes." Oliver whispered this time, his voice filled with despair.

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><p><strong>AN2: OK, so I'm fairly sure (hopeful) you lovely readers are going to have thoughts &amp; comments after <em>that ending<em>, so please review and let me know what they are :-D**


	30. Chapter 30

**AN: OK so this chapter is for all of you who've been asking what about poor Tommy and plugging for him :-) Your support means so much to me, thank you!**

**RENNIE THANK YOU LOADS FOR MY BIRTHDAY WISHES ON YOUR UPDATES TODAY! Love you hun!**

**Disclaimer: (Run out of interesting ways to say it too Rennie) You guys know the drill, Arrow & all their scripts etc are still owned by CW, not me.**

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><p><em>"No, no! Tommy. It should have been me. Open your eyes Tommy!" He choked out the instruction in floods of tears, raw grief making his voice break as he spoke. "Open your eyes." Oliver whispered this time, his voice filled with despair.<em>

_**Oliver's POV**_

Despite the grief and despair overwhelming him Oliver continued to carry Tommy the rest of the way outside. He would not,_could not _leave his friend in the midst of the destruction Merlyn had caused.

Oliver bent his head over Tommy, tears filling his eyes before gasping in surprise. Whilst Tommy was not breathing Oliver was sure he'd felt the faintest of pulses still beating for just a second there. There it was again. An incredibly faint, irregular, flutter but it was there! Oliver had spent too long living purely by his senses and his instincts to ignore them now. Oliver knew he had to do something fast if he was to have even a small chance of keeping Tommy alive.

He shouted at Detective Lance for help letting the desperation and urgency show clearly in his voice, before bending back over Tommy and starting CPR. Thankfully Lance responded not just to Oliver's words, but to his tone, and before he'd given Tommy more than a few breaths the EMTs were there.

"We've got him, Sir we've got him."

Oliver backed away just barely enough to give the EMTs space to work. He had no intention of letting Tommy out of his sight however. Oliver reacted without thinking when he felt a hand on his arm trying to pull him away and just barely managed to pull his punch in time to stop himself from hitting Lance in the face.

"You gotta let them do their job." Lance said without mentioning his need to duck – for which Oliver was grateful.

"You need to go, get out of here before others spot you."

Oliver knew that Lance was right and that he was trying to protect him. Every minute he stayed was putting his identity more at risk, but Tommy was more important. H_ow can I leave him now?_

"I'll stay with him, don't worry – Laurel will be here too."

Lance's tone was reassuring and contained a strong promise that Oliver knew he could trust. Oliver nodded, he could see Laurel already trying to push through to be with Tommy and Joanna was having a tough time holding her back from the looks of it. But still he hesitated.

"I'm serious, I'll stay with him but you gotta get yourself out of here. Tell our mutual friend I said thank you – she saved a lot of lives tonight, you both did." Lance finished, the gratitude he felt evident in his voice.

Oliver barely registered anything beyond Lance saying 'our mutual friend' however. _Felicity!_ _How could I have forgotten about her?! _She was still in the Glades too and he hadn't heard anything from her over the comms since the back-up device had activated! He prayed yet again that he wouldn't be too late as he gunned his bike at top speed and headed back towards the lair.

The journey was taking Oliver slightly longer than normal as he had to keep avoiding all the wreckage from Merlyn's quake. Oliver couldn't have cared less how many emergency services saw him now as he wasn't wasting any time avoiding them tonight. Nothing would stop him from getting back to Felicity. He had his helmet on and Oliver knew that they had bigger problems on their hands right now than catching the Vigilante.

All Oliver could think of was Felicity. _Would she be okay, was she still even alive? _Thoughts of all the things that could have happened to her continually tormented him on the drive and he had to struggle to keep his focus on where he was going. Oliver was fighting to hold on with every last scrap he had left in him, truth be told he didn't even know how he was still going with how weak he was from all his own injuries and the amount of blood he knew he must have lost. Oliver was pretty certain he had broken bones from the collapse at CNRI to go along with the cracked ribs Merlyn had inflicted.

Oliver continued to try to reach Diggle and Felicity on the comms, but to no avail. _The comms are down that's all it is, the comms are down it doesn't mean that …_ But Oliver was unable to finish that thought, even to himself. The thought of losing Felicity filled him with more desperation than he had felt since being on the Island, perhaps more than he had ever felt at all. _Tommy was right, I do love her,_ Oliver finally realised. He just hoped that that realisation hadn't come too late.

Oliver got to Verdant after what felt like an eternity but he knew that in reality it had only been a few minutes. His heart was in his mouth as he rounded the corner to see the club still standing. He could see plenty of signs of damage thought so he didn't dare to hope just yet. Oliver threw his bike to the ground before he'd even fully come to a stop and started shouting as he ripped off his helmet.

"Felicity, Felicity, Diggle, Felicity!" Oliver ran towards Verdant as he shouted, jumping over anything and everything that got in his way. "Felicity!"

"Oliver? Oliver!" Felicity shrieked in relief as she and Diggle stumbled out of the side entrance to the club. "We couldn't raise you on the comms, the system went down when one of the beams fell and smashed my computers and you didn't have your cell or anything so we couldn't get hold of you and Diggle told me how badly you were injured but that you'd gone to rescue Laurel anything and then we didn't hear back from you but of course that was because the system was down only we didn't know if that was the real reason or if it was because..."

"Felicity." Oliver finally stopped her babble. Truth be told he'd been more relieved than he wanted to admit. Oliver knew that if Felicity was babbling then she was okay – properly okay, not just his dodgy version of okay.

"I'm fine too if anybody's asking." Diggle said with a smile, clearly showing his relief at the fact that, despite Merlyn's best efforts, they had all survived the Undertaking.

But before they had even had a minute to enjoy their victory Diggle dashed forwards to catch Oliver as he collapsed. The combination of blood loss, multiple injuries and broken bones, and adrenaline crash finally more than Oliver could handle.

The last thing Oliver heard before he passed out was Felicity crying out in panic.

"Oliver!"

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><p><strong>AN2: Yes, Tommy is alive! I am still amazed by how many of you have been plugging for Tommy to survive - this chapter was written for you all - hope you like it?!<strong>


	31. Chapter 31

**AN: Sorry for keeping you guys waiting, but as many of you know I've been working on 'The Island' instead as the Muse decided to go that way. Rennie you really are the best beta ever hun, thanks for putting up with all my transcription typos especially lol! Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: Really? Do I still have to say it? I don't own Arrow!**

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><p><em>The last thing Oliver heard before he passed out was Felicity crying out in panic.<em>

_"Oliver!"_

_**Diggle's POV**_

"Felicity get a table clear, we have to get him sorted enough to get him to a hospital." Diggle said urgently. He knew that Oliver hated hospitals, but the lair was now a long way from being an even vaguely suitable place to treat him. He was clearly badly injured and Diggle was loathe to waste any time getting him to the ER, but there was no way they could take him dressed as the Vigilante either.

Diggle was relieved that Felicity didn't stop to argue or even hesitate before going back into the very building he had only just helped her to escape from. He couldn't help but be impressed by that as it was clear that Felicity's feelings for Oliver were stronger than her fears for herself.

"What do you want to do, he needs a hospital John." Felicity said even as she was picking up what medical supplies she could from where they had been scattered by the quake.

"I know, but we can't take him like this. He needs to be in normal clothes and we're going to have to disguise that arrow stab wound somehow too." Diggle replied.

Felicity nodded, understanding straight away. "There's plenty of his clothes down here and they'll be just as dirty as everything else now so that will look right. We'll just need to add some of the blood." She went to grab one of Oliver's shirts, a hoodie, and a pair of jeans.

"Rebar."

Diggle looked up from removing Oliver's Vigilante clothes, not understanding Felicity's comment. _What's rebar got to do with anything?_

"With all the building collapses Oliver could have been crushed by reinforced concrete and had a piece of rebar pierce him." She expanded explaining.

"Good plan Felicity – especially as it looks like his legs actually _have _been crushed." Diggle agreed. He knew that he was going to have to change the appearance of the entry wound though if they were going to get away with this. As much as he was loathe to cause his young friend more pain and injuries it was just too recognisable as an arrow wound currently.

Diggle knew that the hospitals would all be completely overwhelmed tonight and that all the confusion would work in their favor, but even so it was important to not take any more risks that they had to. _Oliver's going to be unhappy enough about being in a hospital as it is. _He knew there was no choice, he _had _to change that entry wound and Diggle knew that if Oliver were conscious he would say to just do it already.

He knew it was going to take a bit of time to make the necessary changes and it was also clear that Oliver had lost a lot of blood as it was, _too much! _Diggle made the decision to start an IV going of Oliver's blood, even though he hadn't wanted to allow enough time for that initially now that he had been better able to assess all of Oliver's injuries Diggle could see it was more important to take the time and not risk hypovolemic shock.

"The hospitals are going to be short on blood as it is, better to use his own if we have time." Felicity agreed even though Diggle hadn't actually said anything.

"Yeah, maybe not much time but we'll give him as much as we can while we deal with everything else." Diggle finished hanging the IV as he spoke.

The pair fell silent after that, each focused on their respective tasks and just trying to get as much of the painful tasks done as possible before Oliver regained consciousness. Diggle just hoped that this time he would stay out cold until at least after he had dealt with disguising the entry wound. In the past Oliver had nearly always come round right as they were doing the most painful stuff. _He's been through more than enough as it is, just for once can the Universe cut him a break!_

It seemed like the Universe was listening because, for once, Oliver actually stayed unconscious much to Diggle's intense relief - and Felicity's too he could see. In fact he stayed out so long that they made it to the ER and Oliver was taken into surgery without ever regaining consciousness, a fact that had Diggle more worried than he was willing to let on.

While Oliver was in the OR Diggle checked in with MrsQueen, having managed to convince an old friend at the county lock up that even MrsQueen deserved to know her son had been badly injured and was in surgery. Letting Thea know had been much easier and much to his relief she had agreed to let Laurel know too. If he was honest with himself he didn't actually care if Laurel knew or not – but Felicity had reminded him that Oliver would want her to know, grudgingly Diggle had agreed that she was right. What mattered was that Oliver would want her to know, not his own feelings on the matter.

At the same time as he had been making calls Felicity had been making some of her own. As she finished her last call Felicity came and sat down next to Diggle and started to update him on what she'd found out.

"Detective Lance says that Tommy's been seriously hurt too. He saved Laurel's life at CNRI but didn't manage to get out himself in time. Apparently the Vigilante carried him out doing CPR at the same time and they got the EMTs to Tommy just in time. He's here in surgery too according to Laurel apparently. Oh, and Detective Lance said that the Vigilante was more stumbling than walking – as if his own legs were crushed and broken. Looks like we know how Oliver's legs got hurt now."

Diggle nodded, understanding what Felicity was getting at. "In other words we're going to have to be very careful that Lance doesn't go putting two and two together again."

_That could be hard considering the Detective had already arrested Oliver once for being the Vigilante. _They'd been able to get out of it that time – but with Lance now knowing about Felicity too it wasn't going to take much for him to put the pieces together Diggle knew. _It will be a lot harder to convince Lance he was wrong a second time. _He put that thought to one side as one of the many things that could wait for later.

Diggle leaned back in the uncomfortable waiting room chair without even really noticing it as he was lost in thought. He realized there was nothing more they could do or needed to actively do now except wait. _Time to take a breath and reassess_. Diggle knew that Oliver would want an update on everything as soon as he came round after the surgery – and he _would _come round, Diggle could not, _would not _allow himself to even think of any other possibilities.

They would need to make sure their cover story was a bit more well**-**defined before they actually had to explain it to anyone. _Will need to make sure Oliver knows it too. _Diggle thought remembering how he and Oliver had barely been able to cover for his injuries after the fight with Merlyn at Christmas. _Gotta try to avoid that this time!_

"So, Oliver was at Verdant when the quake hit and didn't manage to make it out before a wall collapsed on him?" Diggle asked Felicity knowing that he wouldn't have to explain what he was talking about.

"Only problem is there are not walls in Verdant that have actually collapsed." She pointed out.

"Yeah. Okay where then?"

"Verdant makes sense … after all we need to explain what he was doing in the Glades." Felicity said thoughtfully.

Diggle just stayed quiet knowing the blond was working in through in her head as she spoke and that it was a bad idea to interrupt Felicity when she was thinking or planning, especially if it was related to Oliver.

"What about any of the buildings next to it? It can't be anything in the basement otherwise the Building Inspectors will want to check it over before we can reopen the club." Felicity queried.

"A couple of blocks away there's some abandoned buildings that collapsed into the road." Diggle supplied following her line of thought. _Sometimes this mind reading thing really does help speed things up._

"Okay so he was in Verdant when the quake hit and was trying to get out of there when the building fell, crushing him and a piece of rebar went through his shoulder."

"Yeah that works ..." Diggle nodded approvingly. "... and if they ask he was on his bike and swerved to avoid falling debris before skidding and coming off the bike." Diggle knew how important it was to not supply too much information when being questioned. People don't give that much information when telling the truth unless additional questions are asked, many liars have been caught out that way Diggle remembered from his SF training.

"He has a head wound right?" Felicity queried.

"Yeah, quite a few." Diggle confirmed.

"So we can use them to cover any confusion or missing info then."

Diggle nodded his agreement before falling silent as he ran through his assessment of the rest of the situation.

_Merlyn – dead.  
>First device – deactivated, SCPD dealing with it now.<br>Second device – needs to be found, SCPD again?  
>Tommy – in surgery too.<br>Laurel – fine.  
>Thea – fine.<br>Verdant – okay structurally, cosmetic damage only.  
>Moira – in custody.<em>

Diggle realized that was everything, he would need to keep a close eye on Tommy's condition as Oliver would want to know about him straight away – especially as they now knew how close it had come. He would have done that anyway though, in the time since their secret had been revealed to the younger man Diggle had come to care about him and now counted him as a main part of the Team – even more so since his involvement in rescuing Oliver from Merlyn. Diggle respected Tommy a great deal for doing that and going up against his own father. _That could _not _have been easy! _He was just about to ask Felicity if she could find out anything about his situation when she spoke first.

"Tommy is still in the OR, he's been listed at 'critical' though still." The worry was plain in her voice, Diggle knew she had become close to Tommy too and she would never forget the rescue from Merlyn either. Plus she had even let him work with her on her computers, Felicity didn't let just anyone touch her precious babies!

"No news about Oliver yet though." She finished.

"He'll be okay Felicity, you know Oliver has been through far worse." He tried to reassure her but the attempt was weak as he too was very concerned about the young man who had somehow become like a brother to him over the past year.

Thea arrived then with Roy who was hurt but refusing to leave Thea's side for even a minute, let alone long enough to be patched up.

"How is he?" She asked, her voice full of fear and panic.

Before he could say a word however, the doctor came out. "Are you the family of Oliver Queen?"

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><p><strong>AN2: So, I'm unsure where to go next with this, any ideas? What would you like to see?<strong>


	32. Chapter 32

**AN: So sorry for keeping you all waiting so long for this update! As many of you know I've been busy on my other fics & in particular 'The Island'. I wasn't willing to post until I was actually happy with the update so until the Muse was willing to oblige this had to wait – sorry! Thanks loads for coming back & reading this, really do appreciate it! As ever the biggest cheer goes to Rennie for somehow managing to fit beta work into her currently manic life – thank you hun!**

**Disclaimer: Arrow is still owned by The CW, not me.**

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><p><em>Thea arrived then with Roy who was hurt but refusing to leave Thea's side for even a minute, let alone long enough to be patched up.<em>

_"How is he?" She asked, her voice full of fear and panic._

_Before he could say a word however, the doctor came out. "Are you the family of Oliver Queen?"_

**_Mixed POV_**

"Yes!" Thea exclaimed loudly with a start as she dashed to face the doctor. "I'm his sister, we're all his family."

Felicity was surprised by that, but grateful to Thea for including them, she knew full well that the girl could have chosen to not tell them a thing or let the doctors talk to them. _Must thank her properly for that later."_She thought abstractly as she listened to the doctor begin to speak.

"My name is Dr Holland and I've been treating Mr Queen. Your brother has been very badly injured. I understand he was hurt in the quake?" She asked.

"Yeah." Diggle answered, not expanding beyond that for now.

Dr Holland nodded as she continued. "He's been in surgery for hours and it was touch and go for a while as we fought to save his life."

Thea gasped, the tears streaming down her face and Felicity's heart broke for her, even as she felt numb for herself.

"He should have died by all rights, the blood loss from those injuries should have been more than the body can cope with. Yet, somehow, he doesn't appear to have lost as much as he should have done. I can't explain why, but that's what saved his life. He's in the ICU now and is still seriously hurt, but we believe your brother should be okay." She finished kindly.

Diggle dashed forward to grab Thea who was collapsing with relief but Roy got there first, despite his own injuries. He helped Roy to get Thea onto a chair as the doctor checked her pulse.

"Thanks man." Roy said gruffly to Diggle. "Is she okay?"

"She's fine, it was just the shock. Her pulse is stabilizing already." Dr Holland said much to the relief of all three. She couldn't quite comprehend how Thea Queen, a street kid, a man who looked like a private security guy or bodyguard, and a young woman who looked like a bit of a geek could possibly be 'family' - but it was clear that they all cared for each other and very deeply for Oliver Queen. She knew it wasn't her place to question, Miss Queen had said they were family, effectively giving her permission to talk to them all so that was all that was relevant for now.

Diggle and Felicity exchanged looks full of relief that they had taken the time to give Oliver that blood now. Diggle's call had saved Oliver's life according to the doctor, although neither would ever admit to the hospital what they'd done. To do so would raise far too many questions.

"What are Oliver's injuries?" Diggle queried, taking charge again now that new Thea was alright.

"He has broken bones in both legs, it appears they were crushed?" Dr Holland said questioningly.

Diggle nodded, he knew he had to be the one to answer as otherwise they would only have to explain why Felicity had been in the Glades with Oliver as well. "I found him with a wall on top of him, he'd come off his bike from the look of it."

"Well from what we can tell his shoulder was pierced by something as well, maybe a piece of rebar. Was the wall reinforced?"

Diggle simply shrugged in response, making sure to be careful not to reveal too much information and risk tripping them up later.

"He was very lucky. If you removed that when you got him out then it's a miracle he didn't bleed to death. You need to make sure you don't remove anything if you're ever in a rescue situation again." She lectured Diggle who just nodded at her. Dr Holland sighed before continuing. "The shoulder wound is quite bad and will definitely leave a scar, but I saw he has plenty of those already. He also hasseveral cracked and broken ribs, as well as others that are just bruised. Your brother is very lucky he didn't puncture a lung. We will need to keep an eye on those as he comes round to make sure they don't do any further damage. He also has multiple cuts and bruises, some deeper than others, many of which required stitches. On top of that he has several head wounds so it's very likely he will be concussed. However, his brain scan came back clear so we don't expect there to be any lasting damage there."

"So, he's gonna be okay?" Thea asked, still looking very pale. She'd heard the doctor's words well enough, but the sheer amount of injuries was overwhelming her on top of everything else that had happened that night, and she just needed it broken down simply for her. _Will Oliver be okay?_

"Yes. It's going to be a long recovery and he will need physiotherapy and a lot of care. We've set his legs properly but it's too soon to tell if he will be left with any lasting impairments, those were nasty breaks. Right now we need to watch for any signs of infection from all the dirt that was in the wounds, as well as keep an eye on his sats – his oxygen saturation levels, and his blood pressure too. We are giving him strong antibiotics as a precaution as well as a blood transfusion to replace the rest of his blood loss. He will be in the ICU at least a day or so I believe. But yes, Miss Queen, your brother will be fine."

Felicity half coughed half choked as she covered her slightly hysterical laugh at the doctor's unknowing use of Oliver's favorite word to describe his own condition whenever he was injured. She caught Diggle's eye and knew he'd had to smother his own smile at that too. _Of all the words she could have used!_Now that they knew Oliver was going to be 'fine' though there was one more person they needed to ask about and Felicity figured it was best to do so while Thea was here as again the girl may get the doctors to be more willing to reveal information than they would be to just her and Diggle.

"Thank you doctor! What about Tommy, Thomas Merlyn? We understand he was brought in as well, he's Oliver's best friend."

Dr Holland looked at Felicity for a second, calculating before she answered. _Strange that she should ask about the one other person whose injuries didn't appear to match up with just being involved in a quake – and both men seemed to have been crushed and had been injured by rebar._There was more going on here than she was being told Dr Holland sensed. However, as long as it didn't affect the medical care of her patients it wasn't any of her business and they were simply too busy for her to waste time on enquiries she knew.

"Mr Merlyn has also been very seriously injured, however he has just come off the critical list and was just being moved to the ICU when I left. Again, it is hoped that he will fully recover, but his injuries are worse, if not as varied as Mr Queen's, so we don't know yet for certain. His girlfriend and her father, the police officer, are waiting to be able to see him now. Beyond that I'm afraid I can't say as you're not his family as well – are you?" Dr Holland wouldn't normally have added that query, but nothing about this whole situation seemed to be normal and so she'd decided to act on the safe side and check, just in case.

"No, but our families grew up together and he's like another brother to me." Thea answered for them much to Diggle's relief. He hadn't known how to answer and was worried about Felicity's nervous or relieved babbling taking over – there was a good reason they'd got Tommy to do all the cover stories after all!

"Then I suggest you go and see them after you've seen your brother Miss Queen." Dr Holland said kindly. "Your brother can have visitors, but only two at a time for now. We don't expect him to regain consciousness for quite some time yet, realistically it may not be until tomorrow at the very earliest, if not the day after."

Thea nodded and Felicity could see how much the young girl was struggling to find the words to say.

"Thank you Doctor. We really appreciate everything you've done for Oliver more than we can say." Felicity answered for them all, the others nodding their agreement to her sentiments. _Doubt it'll be anywhere near as long as the Doctor thinks though as Oliver never stays out for that long. He'll be round before then…_Suddenly Felicity panicked, _what happens when Oliver does come round, there aren't any restraints here and if someone gets too close…_

Diggle saw the panic in Felicity's eyes at the same time as he had reached the same point in his own thinking. "Doctor, there's something you need to be aware of…" He hesitated slightly, hating to reveal so much with Thea and Roy present but knowing there was no choice.

"Yes?" Dr Holland prompted.

"Oliver, you may be aware that he was shipwrecked for five years. Well, you've seen his scars so you know he went through quite a lot during that time, he suffers from PTSD style nightmares. He can be quite dangerous to those around him when he first awakens. Your staff needs to be aware to not get too close and to definitely _not_ touch him until he's fully with us." Diggle felt awful for saying this, revealing the younger man's secrets and he was grateful to see Felicity's look and nod of support. She communicated her agreement without needing words as ever and Diggle appreciated that more than he could say.

"Thank you for the warning Mr …?"

"Diggle, John Diggle. I'm Oliver's bodyguard and friend."

"Thank you Mr Diggle. My staff is quite familiar with PTSD, we treat a lot of veterans at this hospital so I will make them aware to take the same precautions. I appreciate you telling me that." Dr Holland said gratefully. She had already recognized the military bearing and poise this man had and knew that it would not have been easy for him to break his friend and employer's confidence to reveal the PTSD. It hadn't escaped her that he had looked at Miss Queen when he'd said 'PTSD style' so she could only assume that the sister wasn't as aware of things as he was. She told them where the ICU was and left the group then to warn her staff, before moving on to her next patient.

Felicity saw the look of in Thea's eyes and knew that she would need support to see Oliver in this state. Roy still needed to get patched up as well and somebody needed to go check on Tommy. Also, despite Diggle's warnings, she wanted to be sure nobody got too close when Oliver came round. The last thing he would need was for somebody to be hurt because they'd been too close – especially not Thea. As before, she could see Diggle reaching the same conclusions as her and knew she didn't need to worry about her suggestions.

"Thea, do you want me to go with you? Roy needs to get those injuries seen to." She asked quietly.

"I'll go check on Tommy, be back as soon as I know how he's doing." Diggle said confirming Felicity's plan.

"You gonna be okay if I go for a few minutes?" Roy asked gently, needing to be sure she would be okay before he left her. For some reason he instinctively trusted the blond, _Felicity?_ He knew she would take care of Thea and he could clearly see how much she cared about Oliver. When Thea didn't respond though, he spoke again. "Thea? Will you be alright if Felicity goes with you while I get these seen to? I'll be back as soon as I can."

"Huh, what? Yeah ok." Thea replied, still somewhat shocked and not completely aware of what was going on around her. She took a couple of breaths as Mr Diggle had told her, before looking up and meeting their eyes, fully registering what was being said for the first time.

"Thea? I can go with you if you want to see Oliver? Diggle's going to check on Tommy and Roy really needs to get those seen to." Felicity repeated now that she could see Thea was back with them.

"Err, yeah, thanks." Thea nodded gratefully, not really having the energy for conversation.

"Okay, it's this way." Felicity took charge leading the way as she knew that Thea hadn't taken in the doctor's directions. "See you soon." She said to Diggle as she left, Thea following behind her.

When they entered Oliver's room Felicity had to put aside her own feelings of shock to catch Thea again as she swayed worryingly. Oliver was hooked up to machines keeping an eye on his sats and blood pressure, there were tubes carrying vital fluids and blood into him. His body covered in white bandages with a mass of purple bruising showing around them on his torso where he wasn't covered by the blanket and both legs were in casts. "Oliver." Her voice broke as she spoke his name, before her attention returned to Thea.

Thea was more shocked and shaken than ever. It had been bad enough seeing the state her brother had been in at Christmas but he looked even worse now. He was so _still_and he looked younger she realized without all the tension he normally exuded. She was grateful to Felicity for coming with her and stopping her from falling again. The depth of feeling in Felicity's voice when she spoke her brother's name hadn't escaped Thea's attention. No matter what they said about being friends, it was clear that she had far more than platonic feelings Thea noted abstractly.

"Thank you." Thea said quietly, knowing the words weren't enough, but they were all she had right now.

Felicity just nodded, smiling kindly as she brought the two plastic chairs up closer to the bed before indicating to Thea to sit in the nearer of the two to Oliver. The pair sat like that for a while, Thea holding Oliver's hand and Felicity resting hers on his leg feeling the edge of the cast through the blanket. Despite pretending to just sit quietly waiting like Thea though, she was watching Oliver closely for any sign of regaining consciousness and she told herself that was the only reason why her hand was on his leg. She needed to be ready to pull Thea away immediately, to protect her just in case.

Diggle and Roy returned within minutes of each other and joined the vigil, completely ignoring the rule of only two visitors at a time. "Tommy's blood pressure is slowly coming back up and his sats are improving. He's got a lot of injuries and his legs are in casts too." Diggle commented, noting Oliver's own casts. _Oliver's not going to like them!_"But they think he's going to be okay. Detective Lance has agreed to let us know if there's any change."

Diggle caught Felicity's eye to let her know that that wasn't all the Detective had said, they would need to talk about that later and work on some damage control. She gave the slightest of nods in return to let him know she understood. Roy then left the room coming back barely a minute later with two more chairs, one of which he passed to Diggle, before moving to draw the other up behind Thea.

Felicity moved faster though, taking the chair from him and offering him her own. She then took the other chair around to the opposite side of the bed with Diggle, her hand taking Oliver's other hand. The four of them stayed that way in companionable silence. Each caught up with their own thoughts of the past day and not wanting or needing to talk further.

When a nurse came in later to change the IVs she was about to object to the number of people when she took one look at the glares on both Diggle's and Felicity's faces, before deciding that discretion was the better part of valor and retreating. _It wasn't as if they were being noisy or anything and he's unconscious anyway._ She told herself, excusing her actions, before returning with four cups of coffee which were gratefully received.

"My name is Emily and I'm Mr Queen's nurse. Let me know if you need anything." She said as she smiled at them before leaving again. She was pleased to see that this man who was so broken, and who had clearly been through so much already from his scarring, had people around who evidently cared for him a great deal. She had been a PTSD nurse long enough to know that the support people had often meant far more to their recovery than their medical care; and she knew that that was one thing she would not have to worry about for this patient at least.

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><p><strong>AN2: So, I'm now working on the final ending for this fic so if you have any requests or thoughts now is the time to let me know :D Please be kind enough to let me know what you think. Thanks loads!<strong>


	33. Chapter 33

**AN: So sorry to have kept you all waiting again! The Muse refused to let me work on anything other than my fic The Island - sorry! I am already working on the next chapter of this though so will do my best not to keep you waiting again. Thank you all so very much for sticking with me! Big thanks to KenyanCougar for doing the beta on this while my lovely regular beta Rennie75 is on holiday! :D All mistakes remain mine however :D**

**Disclaimer: The CW own Arrow, I don't. **

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><p><em>"My name is Emily and I'm Mr Queen's nurse. Let me know if you need anything." She said as she smiled at them before leaving again. She was pleased to see that this man who was so broken, and who had clearly been through so much already from his scarring, had people around who evidently cared for him a great deal. She had been a PTSD nurse long enough to know that the support people had often meant far more to their recovery than their medical care; and she knew that that was one thing she would not have to worry about for this patient at least.<em>

**_Diggle's POV_**

Diggle, Felicity, Roy, and Thea stayed at Oliver's side sitting mostly in silence for what seemed like ages. Diggle went to get coffee and food for everyone several times and at the same time took the opportunity to check up on Tommy. Tommy was now stable and his blood pressure had normalized. Detective Lance had promised to let them know if there was any change in his condition and had asked about Oliver at the same time, saying that he would let Laurel know for them too. Diggle had been grateful for that as he hadn't relished the idea of talking to Laurel himself.

Diggle could understand Laurel's devotion to her work, but if Laurel had just left CNRI when she'd been told to then neither Oliver nor Tommy would have been crushed and in the state they were now. He knew of course that Oliver's injuries had been bad even before that point, but he wouldn't have had crushed legs and more broken ribs on top of everything else, and they would have been able to treat him sooner instead of cutting things as close as they clearly had. He could see that Felicity shared his views, but equally they both knew that there was no point in focusing on that. Oliver _had _survived, Tommy _had _survived, and despite the concerns that the doctors had Diggle knew that Oliver would be okay. They didn't know him and his determination like Diggle, there was no way that Oliver would allow himself to be at anything other than full fitness by the end of this and so Diggle had no worries – even if he knew that Oliver would be a nightmare to live with until that point.

After a few more hours of sitting and waiting Diggle noticed a hint of a flicker of movement and instantly met Felicity's eyes, yes she'd seen it too.

"Thea, Roy get back, he's coming round." Diggle said urgently as he went swapped places with Felicity, making sure that she was out of the way of danger as well. He was relieved to see that despite Thea's protestations Roy was pulling her back away from Oliver. _Seems like he was listening to what we said even if she didn't take it in _Diggle thought abstractly while he was focusing on Oliver.

Although there had been no further movement from Oliver, Diggle had noticed the slightest flicker on the heart monitor so knew that he'd been right, Oliver _was_ waking up – and he was still in pain according to the monitor. Diggle put his hand cautiously on Oliver's shoulder, being careful to not actually shake him or touch any of his wounds, as he started to speak.

"Oliver, Oliver it's Diggle, You're okay Oliver, you're safe." Diggle spoke calmly but clearly, keeping his hand on Oliver's shoulder even as he moved to avoid Oliver's arm as he lashed out instinctively, tearing out the drip in the process. Diggle was glad he had been prepared and watching for it, even in Oliver's incredibly weakened state that had still been a hard blow and could have done a fair bit of damage – especially if it had caught Felicity or Thea he knew.

"Wake up Oliver, it's Diggle, it's okay you're safe." Diggle ignored the hit as kept up his words, repeating them in the calmest, most reassuring tone he could manage until Oliver calmed and opened his eyes.

"Diggle? Felicity?" Oliver asked weakly as he met Diggle's eyes.

"Yeah man, we're here. We're all safe, it's okay." Diggle repeated reassuringly meeting Oliver's eyes and staying locked onto them, even as he signaled to Felicity it was okay to approach. He knew that she would let Roy and Thea know so he left that to her, not wanting to let go of Oliver's shoulder yet as Diggle knew that the younger man was using that contact to ground himself.

**_Mixed POV_**

"Tommy?" Oliver asked as he looked to Felicity, he knew that there were others in the room too but he needed to see her to reassure himself that she was okay, even as he asked about his best friend. _Did Tommy make it? _Oliver asked with his eyes, not being able to form the words themselves, but knowing at the same time that there was no need to.

"Tommy's okay Oliver, he's in the hospital too but he's going to be okay. He made it to CNRI and saved Laurel. Everyone's okay you don't need to worry." Felicity reassured him, having known instantly what he was truly asking.

Oliver sighed with intense relief, nodding his thanks as he lay back on what he knew was a hospital bed. Even before he looked around Oliver could tell from the smell of disinfectant and the beeping from all the monitors that he was in a hospital room and he was less than impressed, but knew that his friends would have had no choice this time. _That's why I feel out of control, they must be giving me pain meds, need to get them stopped. Wonder what the cover story is this time? _Oliver thought even as he registered that Thea and Roy were in the room too, he knew that he would have to be careful what he said until Diggle could give him a clue what they were using for a cover this time.

"Your bike's trashed though man, part of that wall must've crushed it too." Diggle advised carefully, trying to let Oliver know what the story was that they had told Thea and the hospital without making it too obvious.

Oliver smothered a smile as he quickly looked at Felicity so that he could turn his head away from Thea. Somehow he had known the cover story it would involve a motorcycle, it nearly always did when Diggle came up with it. He tried to sit up, needing to be able to see better to assess his own injuries as the meds were making it harder for him to be properly aware of everything. He looked at Diggle as he tried to move and was grateful when the older man moved instantly to help him.

"Thea, why don't you and Roy go let Dr Holland know that Oliver's awake now? She's going to need to replace that drip." Diggle suggested as gently as he could while still making it clear that there was little choice in the matter. He knew that she would not be impressed, but he also knew that Oliver had questions and that was more important right now.

Roy at least clearly got the message and he gently took Thea's arm as he led her to find the doctor, much to the relief of the other three. Oliver looked to his friends quickly even as Diggle finished helping him to sit up properly, needing the fastest update they could give him.

"Tommy's badly injured but out of danger, he'll be okay. Your Mom's in jail. Merlyn's dead. SCPD are dealing with the devices. Everyone else is okay. Your legs were crushed and broken but with a lot of physio we know you'll be okay, docs aren't so sure yet but they don't know you. You've got broken and cracked ribs. You came off your bike as you were leaving Verdant before a reinforced concrete wall fell on you, piercing your shoulder with a bit of rebar – sorry about the extra damage man, had to disguise it somehow." Diggle finished speaking as quickly as he could, knowing they would have minutes at most before Thea returned with the doctor.

Oliver nodded his understanding, but before he could say anything else he heard Thea's footsteps approaching fast with two other sets, Roy's and the doctor's he assumed and was soon proved right as the entered the room.

"Mr Queen, I'm Dr Holland and I'm the one who has been treating you." She shone a pen light in both of his eyes, pleased to see that his pupils were equal and reactive. "I must say I'm surprised to see you awake this soon, we honestly thought you wouldn't come round until tomorrow. How are your pain levels, do you need any more pain medication?" She asked, truly surprised that he was conscious already and worried that it must have been his pain levels that had brought him round so soon. Dr Holland saw the damage to the IV that his sister had told him about and moved to the supply cart to get the things she would need to replace it.

"They are fine, but you can stop the meds now please, I don't need them." Oliver replied politely but bluntly, ignoring the shocked responses from Thea, Roy and the doctor. He had expected these responses after all, but had no intention of staying on the meds now that he was conscious.

"Mr Queen, I'm not quite sure you understand, you've had some very bad injuries and you are going to _need _those painkillers!" Dr Holland was stunned by his request, it was the last thing she had expected him to say. Yet it was clear from his speech, tone of voice, and his eyes that her patient was not confused, and that he was aware of what he was saying.

"Speedy can you and your boyfriend give me a minute with the doctor please?" Oliver asked, again making it clear that it was not a question. He knew she had seen more than he wanted her to of his scars but she knew nothing about what had caused them and he wanted to keep it that way. He was relieved to see her nod and didn't miss the fact that she had hesitated until Roy had placed his hand on her arm pulling gently. Much as he didn't really like the kid who had gotten his sister too close to danger by trying to find the Vigilante, he was pleased to see that Roy was trying to respect Oliver's wishes. Once they had left, Roy closing the door after them, Oliver looked back to the doctor and began to speak.

"Dr Holland I am aware of my injuries, I have crushed and broken legs, broken and cracked ribs, a piece of rebar pierced my shoulder, and I have a lot of bruising too. I know that you have seen my scars and that Diggle will have warned you not to approach me when I first came round because of PTSD. You will be aware from those scars that I have been through a lot and I am sure you will understand it is not something I want to talk about." Oliver's tone was polite but blunt and it brooked no room for argument as he continued speaking.

"I am also fully aware that you will have also seen my x-rays and will therefore know that I had at least twelve fractures that never properly healed while I was away. I know exactly what my pain levels will be and I am telling you that I do not need or want any pain medication and I do not want that IV to be replaced."

"Oliver." Felicity said calmly, but warningly, letting him see that she did not agree with his words. She knew that he could take the pain of course but, as much as she knew he hated the meds, she saw no need for him to be in that much pain when there was no chance of him needing to be the Vigilante for the immediate future at least.

"Fine." Oliver sighed "I will agree to take some Tylenol but nothing much stronger than that."

Dr Holland was stunned to say the least as well as being completely bemused. It was clear that although the blonde had only said his name, there had been an entire conversation going on that she was not privy too. Right now however, she was thankful to her as she had at least been able to get Mr Queen to agree to take some tablets. It was nowhere near enough in her opinion and she was worried about the damage that that much pain could do. At the same time though, Dr Holland was forced to admit he was right, she had seen his scars and his x-rays and the amount of trauma both had revealed were horrific to her. She was also aware that he had told everybody that island was deserted, she had seen the media on his return like everyone else; but as she had told Mr Diggle, she treated a lot of veterans and recognized the signs of torture when she saw them. She sighed, knowing that if she was right then getting him to take anything he really didn't want to would be almost impossible.

"Fine, but you have to agree to leave the monitors in place for now then. If your pain levels cause your heart rate to become too elevated however then we will need to reassess." Dr Holland spoke as bluntly as Mr Queen had, letting him know that she could not be pushed around when it came to what was in the best interests of her patients' healthcare.

Oliver nodded, willing to agree to her terms for now at least. "What about removing the other IV?" He asked, keen to be as free from the tubes and machinery as possible.

"Provided that you keep drinking and do not show any further signs of dehydration then as soon as this bag of fluids has finished I will agree to disconnect it. The cannula stays in place though until tonight just in case we need it again." Dr Holland agreed to the compromise as Mr Queen's obs were good, she was happy for the fluid IVs to stop now that he was conscious and able to drink on his own now anyway.

"Fine, do you know how my friend Tommy Merlyn is doing? I understand he was brought in as well, Diggle's told me that he is stable but I was hoping you would be able to get an update on his condition for me." Oliver was keen to get as much information as he could about Tommy. He really wanted to go and see him but he knew that that was not going to be possible just yet so had to content himself with asking the doctor instead.

"I don't know anything else right now but I will find out for you. First though you need to let me deal with where the IV was pulled out okay." She insisted.

Again Oliver nodded, allowing her to dress the IV site before she left and sent Thea and Roy back in. Thea came straight over to him and it was clear that she wanted to give him a hug but was scared to hurt him. Oliver held his arm out inviting her closer and showing her he was okay.

"Is everything okay Oliver, what did the doctor say? You _are_ going to take the pain meds aren't you?" Thea asked, her voice laced with concern.

"I'm fine Speedy, there's nothing to worry about. The doctor and I have come to an arrangement." Oliver could see that Thea was far from convinced however. "You can give me a hug Thea, it's okay, I'm not going to break." Oliver finished with a hint of a laugh.

"Ollie! You _are_ broken!" Thea exclaimed, utterly exasperated with her brother even as she embraced him carefully.

"I'm fine Thea, I'm fine." Oliver finished, not missing the looks on Felicity's and Diggle's faces as the pair rolled their eyes at him.

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><p><strong>AN2: Please be kind enough to let me know what you think, thank you! :D<strong>


	34. Chapter 34

**AN: Again big thanks go to KenyanCougar for playing beta while Rennie75 is on holiday! Rennie - sorry you didn't get a sneak peek of this one but I thought it would be a nice surprise :D**

**Thank you so much to all of you who have taken the time to come back to this fic and read, follow, fav, and/or review - your support is truly appreciated!**

**Thoughts are in italics as usual :)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Arrow, doh! The CW do.**

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><p>"<em>Ollie! You <em>are _broken!" Thea exclaimed, utterly exasperated with her brother even as she embraced him carefully._

"_I'm fine Thea, I'm fine. " Oliver finished, not missing the looks on Felicity's and Diggle's faces as the pair rolled their eyes at him._

**_Mixed POV_**

Over the next day Oliver continued to make progress and very soon he refused to take anything other than a Tylenol, which he would only take when Felicity insisted. He continued to worry about Tommy however who had still not regained consciousness. Oliver knew that the doctors had not actually expected Tommy to come round yet, but still, he was concerned about his best friend and wanted more than anything to go and see him.

"Oliver, it doesn't matter how much you glare at me I am not gonna take you to see Tommy unless the doctor and Felicity both agree to it!" Diggle said yet again. He knew how worried Oliver was and, having now heard the story of how Oliver had thought Tommy had actually died, he could completely understand his friend's need to see Tommy – but that did not mean he was willing to go up against Felicity for him.

"Okay Oliver, I've spoken to Dr Holland again for you and she has agreed that we can take you to see Tommy tomorrow morning after the doctors have done their rounds. Now quit glaring at Diggle." Felicity ordered. She had only just come in the room but didn't need to have seen or heard either of them to know that Oliver would have been glaring at Diggle again, he had been doing it for most of the day, whenever Thea wasn't there.

Felicity knew that Thea was extremely curious about why she and Diggle were spending so much time at the hospital and why Oliver never seemed to want them to leave. Sooner or later they were going to have to answer some of her questions, but for now the teen had been willing to leave things be and Felicity knew that Thea was just grateful to have her brother back in the land of the living.

Diggle had had a quiet word with Dr Holland the previous day while he was meant to be getting another round of coffees and had explained to the doctor how it would be best for all concerned if they stayed overnight as Oliver's injuries would be likely to trigger off some pretty bad nightmares. He had explained that Oliver didn't want Thea to know about them so Dr Holland had been careful to ask Oliver's opinion on the matter during one of her rounds when she had asked all four to leave, wanting to be certain that she got an honest answer out of her patient. Initially she had been inclined to deny the request, after all her staff were more than competent at dealing with PTSD. However, she had seen the flicker of relief that passed over Mr Queen's face, brief though it was, and had decided that provided they stayed as quiet as they had all day and continued to stay out of the way of her staff, it would do no harm to allow them to stay.

Dr Holland had had a quiet word with Mr Diggle again later and confirmed that she would agree to it. She informed him that she would arrange for a cot to be brought in for one of them and had been about to say that two would not fit but he had quickly replied that that would not be needed and explained that they did not want Thea to be aware of the arrangement. Dr Holland had understood and agreed willingly enough, it meant less work for her staff after all.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The next morning all three of them were feeling pretty tired and worn out. Oliver had had several nightmares over the course of the night, just as he had done the first night, and consequently they had all had little sleep. On top of that Oliver was as impatient as ever for the doctor to do her rounds so that he could go to see Tommy. After seeing Oliver's eyes flick to the clock on the wall, back to the door, to her, to Diggle, and then back to the clock for what felt like the millionth time Felicity had had enough.

"Oliver! I know you want to go see Tommy but glaring at the clock and the door and both of us is _not_going to make the doctor come any soon and before you ask no I am not going to go see where she is you are not her only patient and you will wait until she is ready to see you!" Felicity ordered bluntly, being careful to avoid looking at the grin that was forming on Diggle's face. _The last thing I need is to grin too when I'm trying to be all 'Grrr' with him!_

Oliver however saw the smirk flash over Diggle's face and turned his glare back on him instead. He knew that Felicity was right and he was willing to admit, to himself at least, that patience had never been his strong suit. He turned back to watching the clock and the door again, but this time kept his eyes away from Felicity as he didn't want to cross her any further while he couldn't get up and defend himself. Oliver knew that he was going to have to talk properly to Felicity at some point, soon, he had come too close to losing her to allow much more time to go by without telling her how he felt. But right now he needed to concentrate on Tommy first.

Finally Dr Holland arrived to do her rounds and after checking Mr Queen over she agreed that he could now be taken down to see Tommy. Dr Holland had had to cover the hint of a smile that ghosted over her face when she had asked Mr Queen how he was doing today only to be told he was 'fine'. She had quickly learned that that was his default answer to any and all questions concerning his health, condition, and pain levels. She could also see that from the looks and eye rolling that she had seen coming from both Mr Diggle and Ms Smoak in response, it was something that they were both used to hearing as well.

Dr Holland couldn't help but continue to compare him to the Vets she treated. He might never have been in the Forces, but it was abundantly clear to her that he had been through some equally horrific experiences – without the benefits of any training and again she was amazed by the fact that he was still going strong. Dr Holland could see that this was in no small part due to these two that had been continually by his side since his return from that island and she was grateful on his behalf for the fact that her patient had the two of them looking out for him.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Eventually the three of them made it down to see Tommy. Both Laurel and Detective Lance were in the room with him and Lance was in everyday clothes much to Oliver's surprise. They were both keeping vigil by Tommy's bedside and neither seemed to hear them approach.

"Not working today Detective?" Oliver queried gently, but making them both jump regardless.

"Oliver!" Laurel's voice was full of relief and it seemed that she was very happy to see him. "I've been so worried about you but I didn't want to leave Tommy. How are you?"

Oliver smiled in response but couldn't help thinking that if she was that worried then she would have been able to leave Tommy with the Detective for a few minutes at least to come and see how he was. He knew that both Diggle and Felicity had been down to check on Tommy's progress quite a few times and that Diggle had done so even before he had come back round. He was careful to ensure that none of that showed on his face however.

"Few broken bones, I got a bit busted up when that wall fell on me but I'm fine." Oliver couldn't help but notice that, unlike Felicity, Diggle, Tommy – and now even the doctor, Laurel did not react at all to his use of the word 'fine' and he realized that she had not noticed how he liked to use it even though all the rest completely disagreed with his definition of the word. The Detective however was looking at him in complete disagreement.

"Yeah, right. If that's your definition of fine Oliver then I'd hate to see what you look like when you're not fine." Lance replied dryly, much to Diggle's amusement.

Lance took in Oliver's appearance noting everything carefully. He was covered in vicious bruising including on his face, he had cuts and scrapes everywhere and his hands were banged up pretty badly. Lance could see through the hospital gown that Oliver's ribs were clearly taped and he knew that Oliver had both cracked and broken ribs. Both legs were in casts and Mr Diggle had informed him they had been crushed and broken. He could see the edges of a large dressing over Oliver's shoulder and he knew, again from Mr Diggle, that Oliver's shoulder had been pierced by a piece of rebar.

Lance couldn't help but notice that all the wounds apart from the legs and shoulder looked like the results of a vicious fight. He also couldn't help but notice that both Tommy and Oliver had wounds from being crushed and pierced by rebar – and that the Vigilante had looked like he had broken legs when he had somehow managed to stagger out of CNRI with Tommy in his arms. There were more similarities here than Lance wanted to think about truth be told, but he knew that this was not the time for questions of that sort. Besides, _whoever_ the Vigilante was, he had saved countless lives that night and Lance figured that if he wanted his identity to remain a secret then he had earned that right – even if the puzzle was going to drive him crazy in the process.

Diggle pushed Oliver closer to Tommy as Laurel and Detective Lance moved to one side to let him through. He noticed the flicker of concern and fear cross Oliver's face for the briefest of seconds before Oliver's mask was back in place again. Diggle looked to Felicity and saw that she had caught it too – and that she was looking just as concerned herself, but that she was not even trying to hide it. He had seen Tommy several times already now of course, as had Felicity, but it was hitting him hard too if he was honest. Tommy had not been meant to be the one who was out in the field that night. At the same time however, Diggle was utterly proud of the young man who lay before him and knew that it could not have been easy for him to have run into that collapsing building to save Laurel. Diggle just hoped she realized how much Tommy loved her and that she returned that love. The last thing he wanted was to see Tommy hurt even further and he knew that he would be looking out for him more than ever now.

Oliver was stunned by how bad Tommy looked with all the pure white dressings that were covering his body and the tubes and wires everywhere. He had never thought he would see his best friend looking like this – hell he had never thought to see anyone he cared about looking like this. He looked up and met Diggle's and Felicity's eyes, the questions clear in his own without the need for words.

_Is this what you feel like when I crash on you? _Oliver asked without speaking.

_Yeah man, you looked a lot like this at Christmas. _Diggle replied just as silently.

_You looked like this two days ago Oliver! _Felicity's unspoken retort was equally clear to both Oliver and Diggle.

Lance noticed the looks going between the three of them and was sure something was going on that he was not privy too. He looked to Laurel, about to query it before noticing that she did not seem to have seen anything. Before he could ask Oliver about it however, Oliver's face suddenly turned back to Tommy, followed almost instantly by Diggle and then Felicity doing the same.

"Tommy!" Oliver's voice was full of hope and fear at the same time.

"Ol..iv..er?"

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><p><strong>AN2: One more chapter to come folks. Please be really nice and let me know what you think - reviews are golden! Thank you so much!<strong>


	35. Chapter 35

**AN: I just want to thank every single one of you so much for sticking with me all the way through this journey - my first ever fic! **

**Rennie75 you have been the most amazing beta & friend & I am eternally grateful to you for bringing me into this amazing world & community. Dioch yn fawr cariad bach, dioch yn fawr! I hope this is a lovely surprise for you upon your return :-D**

**KenyanCougar has been kind enough to beta this for me as Rennie is away - thank you loads my dear! **All mistakes are mine however lol :)****

**Thoughts are in italics as usual :)**

**Disclaimer: The CW own Arrow. I don't, sigh.**

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><p>"<em>Tommy!" Oliver's voice was full of hope and fear at the same time.<em>

"_Ol..iv..er?"_

**_Mixed POV_**

Two months had now passed since the day that Tommy had woken up in the hospital. Both Oliver and Tommy had been released and were both recovering well, although Tommy's recovery was a lot slower going than Oliver's. However, much to both Felicity's and Diggle's relief, Tommy was also a far better patient than Oliver. More than once the pair had agreed that they did not think they would have been able to handle a second patient who was as bad as Oliver!

Tommy had required further surgery to put a pin in his ankle from where the masonry had fallen on him. Much to Oliver's relief however, none of his own breaks had required metalwork, and they had all been greatly relieved on the day that the casts had come off as Oliver had been driving everyone mad! Both Oliver and Tommy had required intensive physiotherapy to start with and Tommy was still going to the hospital on a daily basis for his and would be for some time to come. In Oliver's case however, Dr Holland had soon realized that the physiotherapists had instead had their hands full simply trying to prevent Oliver from overdoing things and doing too much too soon. Again, she had made the parallel between him and the returning Vets that they treated.

In the end Diggle had managed to convince Dr Holland to let him deal with Oliver and had promised to make sure that he would not let Oliver overdo things. _It's a good thing she hadn't asked me to specify whose version of overdoing things I meant! _Diggle couldn't help but think wryly. Somehow he doubted that Oliver's version of rehab would have matched up with the doctor's, or the physiotherapists' version either for that matter - a thought that was borne out as Oliver went up the salmon ladder yet again. Oliver had been annoyed with the amount of muscle tone that he had lost during his time in the hospital and he was now working as hard as he could to regain that tone. He was also still trying to goad Diggle into sparring with him, but Diggle was refusing point blank for now. Even for Oliver that would have simply been too soon Diggle knew.

Felicity, Diggle, and Oliver were all in the lair and Tommy would be joining them shortly. It would be the first time that Tommy had been back in the lair since leaving to confront his father on the night of the Undertaking and to say that Oliver was a little tense about how Tommy would be would have been an understatement. He and Tommy had talked plenty of times both before and after their discharges, but Oliver knew that that would be different to actually being back in the lair with the rest of the Team. In the hospital and at the Mansion they had been Oliver and Tommy, not the Vigilante and a Member of Team Arrow. (Tommy was still not ready to return to his father's home even though Malcolm was dead and Oliver had had no intention of pushing him on that, especially now that his Mom was in jail.)

Both of them were still struggling with nightmares that had only been made worse by the Undertaking and they were also both struggling to come to terms with what their parents had done and the 502 deaths that had been caused by their actions. Tommy was finding that much harder than Oliver though still and Diggle and Felicity were both working with Oliver to try to convince Tommy that he was not to blame for his father's actions.

Felicity looked up as Tommy slowly came down the stairs into the lair, he was doing far better, but stairs were still hard for him. Regardless of that though, he had still wanted to meet down in the lair instead of upstairs in Verdant and none of the others had wanted to argue with him. She was pleased to see that he had the plastic bag from Wal-Mart in his hand and she just hoped that her idea to get them all to relax, and to get a bit closer back to what passed for normal for them, was going to work.

**_Tommy's POV_**

Tommy looked around for a few seconds as he finally made it down the stairs, catching his breath a bit as these stairs were longer and steeper than the ones he had been doing both at the Mansion and with the physiotherapist. He knew that he still had a long way to go before he was back to fit again, but he had just been relieved to have finally been able to discard that awful walking stick the previous day. If Tommy was honest with himself he was still utterly amazed that the four of them and their families had escaped the Undertaking with none of them being injured, except for Oliver and himself. He was still plagued by nightmares of being trapped under that piece of masonry and knew that it was unlikely that those nightmares would easeanytime soon.

Tommy was confused for a second when he could not see Oliver anywhere. Felicity was at her computers as normal and Diggle was trying to break the training dummy again from the look of it, but Oliver? He looked up as he heard a familiar regular metallic clanging sound and was astounded to see that Oliver was making his way up the salmon ladder. Granted, his progress was a little slower than normal, but the fact that he was doing it all amazed and concerned Tommy.

"Oliver?! What on earth are you doing up there? I thought you agreed you wouldn't overdo it?" Tommy looked to Diggle as he finished, he was sure the older man had agreed with the doctor that he would make sure Oliver didn't do too much.

"Don't look at me like that man, it was hard enough to stop him from sparring, I couldn't stop him from doing that as well." Diggle replied defensively to Tommy's look with a hint of a grin and a pointed look of his own that Tommy knew full well was saying that he wouldn't have been able to stop Oliver either - a point which Tommy was forced to concede.

Tommy looked to Felicity, she was the only one that Oliver was scared of and he had thought that she would be able to stop his friend from overexerting himself even if no one else could. Felicity refused to acknowledge his look though but simply held her hand out for the bag instead. Tommy made his way over to her before handing the bag over and wondering just what it was the blonde had in mind this time. She had been very specific in what she had instructed him to buy and told him that nothing else would do. Tommy had not understood but, as he knew it was safer to simply follow her instructions, he had done as she had told him to anyway without stopping to ask why.

"Oliver, get down here." Felicity ordered.

Tommy was amused yet again to see that Oliver did exactly as she had said without arguing. He knew of nobody else that could get Oliver to do that and he wondered yet again when Oliver was finally going to get around to letting Felicity know that he loved her. He and Oliver had talked about it several times and Oliver had now openly admitted that he did love her – to him at least. Now Tommy just had to get Oliver to admit it to Felicity herself, which was proving to be a lot harder. He had even tried enlisting Diggle's help once but had promptly been stonewalled as Diggle had informed him that that was a job for Oliver's wingman, not his black driver. Tommy couldn't help but smile at the memory of that and he caught Diggle's eyes as he did so, knowing that the older man would realize what he was thinking about.

"What is it Felicity?" Oliver queried, the confused tone clear in his voice.

Tommy understood exactly why Oliver was confused, Felicity had used her 'I'm in control' voice, the one that none of them dared argue with, but at the same time it was clear from her voice and body language that there was nothing wrong.

"Sit down Oliver. Diggle, Tommy, you too. We've all been through a lot these past few months and it's been hard for all of us in a lot of different ways and we've all had to do things that we didn't want to do not that I'm saying that we didn't want to save The Glades because we did it's just that we didn't want to stop your father Tommy well we did want to stop him we just didn't want to _stop him_ stop him.." Felicity paused and took a deep breath as Oliver quirked an eyebrow at her. "…Three...two...one. Anyway, the point is that we have all had more than enough to deal with and we need to be able to get back to it being us again, Team Arrow. Before we can do that though we all need to process and as we all know Mint Chip is the best way to process." Felicity finished with a grin as she reached into the bag and pulled out four one pint tubs of Mint Chip ice-cream and passed one tub to each of them together with a spoon.

Tommy grinned at that as Diggle smirked too and he was amazed to hear Oliver let out a brief laugh – the first one that he had heard from him since before the Undertaking. Tommy looked quickly to Felicity and smiled at the triumphant look on her face. Apparently this had been her plan and, unexpected though it was, Tommy was forced to admit it was a good one.

Tommy took the lid off of his pint and followed the example of the others as they dug in to Felicity's favorite flavor of ice-cream. They sat together each enjoying the simple companionship as they ate. There was no rush, sometimes they would stay silent for a while and at other times they would talk about what had happened, or life in general, or some funny little incident. As the afternoon wore on and the ice-cream disappeared Tommy realized that, almost without noticing or understanding how, they _had_ regained their previous equilibrium. They were together as Team Arrow again.

The afternoon turned into evening and Oliver, after a lot of increasingly pointed looks from Tommy, finally accepted that it was time for him to truly talk to Felicity. Oliver studiously tried to avoid both Tommy's and Diggle's faces, knowing that both were watching with intense interest, even while they were attempting to pretend that they weren't. Finally Oliver gave in though and glared once at the pair who, much to his relief, took the hint and walked away giving him the space that he needed to do this.

As Oliver walked over to Felicity he took deep, calming breaths, slowing his heart rate and circulation in the process to allow him to focus and concentrate more easily. He had now accepted how much he loved her and knew that he simply could not risk anything happening to her again, could not stand to risk losing her. He needed Felicity to know how he felt, how much he loved love, and he needed to know if she felt the same in turn. He took one final breath before starting to speak.

"Felicity."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Tommy knew that there was still a long road ahead of him for his recovery and he knew that the others all had things that they still needed to deal with too, including Oliver. But they had made it this far and Tommy now knew that they would continue to make it through, together. They were more than just friends or even family. The bond that the Team had was so much more than that and it went so much deeper. They were friends yes, and they were family too; they were brothers in arms to use Diggle's phrase – they were Team Arrow and Tommy was incredibly proud and thankful to be able to count himself as part of that Team.

He was happier than he could express that Oliver had finally taken the plunge and had now gone to speak to Felicity and, looking at Diggle, Tommy knew the older man shared that happiness. Finally the two were truly talking about their feelings and Tommy realized that he had done his job as wingman after all.

Tommy knew that he would always have questionsand there would always be things he would want to know, but they had moved away from the incessant questions that had plagued him when he first found out who Oliver was. Those questions were no longer in the forefront of his mind and he knew that it was now finally time for him to move on and move past them. It was time for all the questions to be over – and it was finally time for them all to move on, together, as Team Arrow.

**_~Fin~_**

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><p><strong>AN2: Again, my immense thanks to each and every single one of you who has read, followed, favourited, andor reviewed - you are stars! Thank you!**

**Please be kind enough to let me know what you think of this final chapter. I fully admit that some things have been left open, that was on purpose as I may well return to do a sequel in the future, not sure yet :D Thank you!**


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